Saber
by Glory Alchemist
Summary: A young Jedi searches for the secrets of his past.
1. Chapter 1 The End of Everything

**This story is very AU. Anakin doesn't turn to the Dark Side. The Jedi found out about his and Padme's relationship and gave him a choice: leave the Order to be a "family man", or stay and divorce his wife. I know this doesn't seem likely, but Anakin chose to stay. Since his kids are Force sensative, both he and Padme agree that they should be Jedi. Kad and his family were borrowed from Karen Traviss's _Republic Commando_ series. Please don't ask about Ferris.**

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p><em>Endless war rips apart the galaxy. Death follows death, betrayal, bloodlust, hate and rage and noxious fear. In this darkness, there lingers still the tiny but luminous light of love of all kinds: mate for mate, parent for child, friend for friend. Families together make this light, be they birth family or adopted family, Weequay tribe or Mandalorian clan or even Jedi Order. <em>

_But a shadow stretches across the galaxy, squeezing through cracks, reading hearts, twisting and perverting. Day is coming soon to the shuddering, bleeding Republic, the dying Jedi and their flagging army. _

_Day is coming. _

_But some of these families will not survive intact to see it. _

Chapter 1: The End of Everything

Quinlan Vos was glad to be home. For months, with his cumbersome legion in tow, he had flitted from one Force-forsaken outpost on the Outer Rim to another, bruised and battered and still fighting back to back with those he didn't like and didn't trust.

Oh, no, he didn't like the clones. For all their supposedly superior fighting skills, they seemed to die just as quickly as any ordinary soldier at the blasters of battle droids. It took one Jedi three minutes and a bit of exertion to destroy a squadron of the mechanical enemy. It took a squadron of clones eight minutes and five lives guttering out like candles. Even though the Kaminoans continued to laud them to the Jedi and the Republic, Quinlan had seen enough to draw his own conclusions. They were good, yes, but no better than most soldiers he had fought alongside in the days before he was a soldier himself. Their moderately good fighting skills weren't worth the tension he felt whenever he turned his back to them. For he didn't trust the clones, either. There was something wrong about the whole situation, mass-produced men who instantly followed whatever order he barked at them. Something off there…. He had no desire to find out what.

So it was with relief that Quinlan docked his Eta-2 starfighter in the base's hangar and vaulted out of the cursed thing. _I used to like that ship_, he thought dourly as he headed toward the closest exit. He would only really feel better when he got to the Temple, took a blistering hot shower, and slept undisturbed on his own pallet for at least eight hours.

"Sir!" called a familiar voice across the near-empty hangar.

Quinlan stifled a groan. Wouldn't you know it. They _needed_ him again. He turned reluctantly to face the squad of twenty-odd black-armored men marching smartly in his direction. Dangerous men. More clones, he concluded with a cursory inspection of their height and the way they moved. They halted in front of him in that impersonal snap-to the army favored. "Your presence is requested, sir," said the one who was obviously commander, even though his armor was unmarked.

Quinlan crossed his arms across his smelly, stained robes. The sneer that marked his face when confronted with something surprising and unpleasant had already started to show. "For what, commander?"

"Arrest of traitors, sir," the commander said immediately. "Dangerous rouges."

Quinlan had half a mind to bark a refusal and be on his way, but he doubted that would sit well if this got back to the Council, and he was in hot water with them already. "Very well, commander…?"

The man rattled off his serial number, which pleased Quinlan a bit. This one at least didn't expect to be friends with him, like many in his own legion had. They could keep their cute little nicknames to themselves.

"Commander Two-two," he said with a nod. "Let's get on with it." The squad and the Jedi took ordinary transport, a closed hover bus of the sort tour groups used. Quinlan rested his elbows on his knees while Two-two filled him in. "There are at least thirteen hostiles, sir. We put the estimate at fifteen to sixteen. Two are training sergeants from Kamino. There are two females, a Republic auditor and an unidentified Twi'lek. A third male, Mandalorian from the looks of it. The rest are an indeterminate number of clones of the Fett template."

Quinlan twisted to look at him, interest piqued. "What exactly have these beings done?"

Two-two's face had the crisp, blank look of a soldier before a new higher-up, an unknown quantity. "Treachery, sir," he said shortly, as if the rest were obvious.

Deserters from the army perhaps? A Republic auditor. That was interesting. The description of the suspects sounded more like the setup for a trite joke than the summation of a proper security threat. Still, they could be the makings of an odd but effective conspiracy.

Quinlan peered out the transparisteel view plate at the grungy buildings lit by either harsh garish lights or weakly flickering glowstrips. The very edge of the Lower Levels. "How are their fighting skills? And what is your plan for this operation?"

"They're good, sir. The clones and the training sergeants at least know brutal hand-to-hand, not to mention the usual mastery of the standard gear. Blasters and such. That's why we wanted a Jedi along, sir. We plan on going in as soon as we get there, while they're sleeping. We'll put half the squad on reserve, to provide backup once things get hairy. We thought you'd like to come with us, sir, get us in quick and quiet." He waited for approval of this plan.

Quinlan glanced out the window again, trying to get his bearings. He didn't think he had ever been in this sector before. "Approved. And after they are apprehended?"

"We eliminate the threat, sir. We considered-"

"Where is their base located?" Quinlan cut him off impatiently.

Two-two's face stayed starched and expressionless. "An apartment above a restaurant, sir. The restaurant is closed this late."

"Capture only," Quinlan interjected sharply. "This is the sort of operation you don't want to draw attention to. These people likely have neighbors, acquaintances, maybe even friends who live nearby. Don't give them a reason to want to investigate, commander."

Two-two nodded briskly. "Sir, yes, sir." He donned his helmet and checked his blaster. They were close.

Quinlan inspected his lightsaber briefly under cover of his over-robe. Capture, relocate, then eliminate. "Who have your orders come from?" he asked, scrubbing vigorously at a scorch mark on the glazed metal on the hilt.

"The Chancellor, sir."

The aggravating mark just wouldn't come off. He scratched at it with a fingernail. The Chancellor. It must be all right, then. The Council trusted the man, after all. Enough to let him elect his own representative to their ranks, at any rate. The mark stubbornly stayed put.

The hover bus dropped them several blocks from the target. Jedi and commandos stole through the night, silent and nearly invisible, wreathed in the Force and black armor. Two-two ordered ten of his men to position themselves on the roof of the building adjacent, to enter in five minutes' time. They slipped through a rather seedy dining establishment with an oily quality to the air that spoke of large quantities of greasy food.

Quinlan led the way up the narrow stairs to the door of the rented apartment. Closing his eyes, he quested with the Force. Perhaps fifteen beings inhabited the apartment. One was awake, in the main room off the door, but distracted, reflective. The others were all in their beds, fast asleep. The commandos ranged themselves silently around the door, prepared to go in at a second's notice.

Quinlan opened his eyes and snapped his hand down in the "forward" command. A simultaneous exertion of Force power snapped the lock. The awake one jolted to immediate alertness, but it was too late: Quinlan was already through the door. The commandos poured in after him.

The man who leaped at Quinlan was in his sleep clothes only, but coldness radiated from him in the Force. _Best beware._ Quinlan darted in for a quick disabling blow to the knee with a well-placed kick-and sprang back in alarm as a knife flashed into the man's hand, seemingly out of nowhere, and slashed at his leg. The wicked blade just barely missed a vital artery.

Quinlan ignited his lightsaber. Its molten gold blade blazed to incandescent life. Pure hate gleamed in the man's eyes at the sight of it. Quinlan went for him again. He stayed out of range, taking advantage of his lightsaber's reach-but the man danced aside, surprisingly fast for an ordinary human in his sixties. He dropped as the lightsaber slashed over his head and _came up under it_, slicing for a hit to the stomach. Only Quinlan's Jedi reflexes saved him.

He leaped away, felt a hitch as the knife snagged the fabric of his tunic and gashed it open. That was it! He pulled back on his robes sharply when the knife caught at a seam. The man's grip slipped just enough for a Force pull to wrench the blade out of his hand. _There now_, Quinlan thought with ugly triumph as he went onto the offensive. _That wasn't so hard, was it?_ He aimed for the head with his lightsaber. The man ducked away, right into Quinlan's waiting kick to the breastbone. The man collapsed on the ground, and the black blur of a commando fell upon him.

The Force thrummed a warning. Quinlan turned, lightsaber coming up to block a blow he hadn't even known would be there. Another bright, sizzling blade clashed against his. His eyes widened as he stared into a human male's face highlighted by the hot green of a Jedi blade. The young man radiated hard challenge. _Come and get me, Jedi_, he seemed to mock. Quinlan leapt free, across the room and past the other fierce little skirmishes, and landed in a ready stance. Contempt electrified his limbs, and his teeth bared in a snarl. _Battle on my terms, traitor._

The ex-Jedi pursued him across the room. Quinlan plunged into the murky depths of the Force. Its polluted, diseased currents both buoyed and drowned him. The other responded in turn. Their blades clashed as they whirled around the room, barely conscious of the struggle around them.

The occupants of the apartment gave off grim determination. They seemed to think they could actually win this day. Then the rest of the commandos crashed through a hole they blasted in the ceiling, and the battle was swiftly over.

Quinlan dispatched the shocked ex-Jedi with a non-lethal slash to the ribs and a simultaneous Force-push that smashed him against the opposite wall. He paced over to his opponent, slumped barely conscious on the floor, and called the traitor's lightsaber from his nerveless fingers into his own waiting palm. "You don't deserve this," he said aloud, and clipped it to his belt alongside his own.

The commandos set about clearing the prisoners from the wrecked apartment. Half of them were barely conscious. The ones that weren't fought back with the despair of cornered aak dogs determined to inflict as much damage as possible before they were taken out.

Quinlan shuddered as he came down from his adrenaline high. He had to drag himself from the sludgy miasma of the Force. A sledgehammer headache awakened between his temples. He relaxed his body and focused on slowing the wild paroxysms that passed for a heartbeat nowadays. The death knell of his own life source in his ears struck an uncomfortably raw nerve. The mad spasms slowed to a measured beat.

Only then did he hear the thin wail that rose above the strangled curses of the few remaining prisoners and the commandos' loud silence. Puzzled, he followed the sound of it to the unopened door of one of the back rooms. He opened it with a wave of his hand. The light from the hallway jagged across a serviceable carpet to catch the edge of a crib with sculptured bars. A tiny child, no more than a year old, clung to those bars, staring frantically across the room. When he caught sight of Quinlan silhouetted in the doorway, he wailed again.

A baby? Quinlan was at a loss for what to do with the child. Where would such a group of people get a youngling, anyhow? His first thought was _stolen_, but there had been a human female among the hostiles. It was most likely her child. Well, he certainly couldn't leave him standing there howling in misery. He scooped the baby up and carried him to the front of the house. The child flinched away from his touch.

The one remaining hostile was a clone struggling viciously against a pair of commandos who had him in two savage arm bars. The clone's teeth were bared in rage while tears streamed freely down his face. He caught sight on Quinlan with the child then, and his face blanked with horror. "Don't hurt him!" he shouted hoarsely.

Quinlan looked at him coldly. "What exactly do you think I am?"

The baby reached toward the clone and sobbed what sounded like "Mril."

"We have family on Mandalore!" the clone insisted desperately. "Send him to them!"

"Family?" Quinlan asked contemptuously. Clones did not have families. Traitors to the Republic did not deserve them.

The clone tried again. "Kal has family on Mandalore. Ask for Skirata!"

Quinlan held the squirming child toward one of the commandos. They could "ask for Skirata." The thought _He must be about Korto's age_ crossed his mind with a brief sting of regret. He even looked a bit like Quinlan's own offspring, black-haired and ordinary, living under his own clan name of Vos on a distant planet with a woman Quinlan had thought he'd loved. He shoved the memories aside roughly. There was no time for that.

He reached into the Force to seek the calmness and peace he knew it was supposed to bring, stretched his awareness to encompass the room, brushed the distraught child-who twisted to stare at him with terrified eyes. He'd _felt_ it. He was a Force-sensitive.

Quinlan snatched the child back from the commando's outstretched hands. He settled the boy more securely in his arms, felt the infant cringe as if the contact burned him.

The clone strained against his captors hard enough to drag them back through the apartment's door. "Wait! Ask for Skirata, in Keldabe, ask-"

Quinlan kept his attention on the miserable child, studying him physically and with delicate probes of the Force that left the baby shuddering. "What is his name?"

"Send him to Mandalore!"

He glanced up in irritation. "Tell me his name, or I'll give him one myself."

Even hate had deserted the clone's face now, leaving only desperation. "Kad! Kad Skirata! He has family there, send him to Mandalore-"

"Mandalore?" Quinlan snorted.

"Yes, he has an uncle-!"

"No."

The clone fell silent as if he had been punched.

"He would be corrupted and wasted on Mandalore. He will be much more happy and useful where I am taking him: the Jedi Temple."

The clone's eyes glazed. With a blood-curdling shriek of rage, he burst from his captors' grips and shot across the room toward the Jedi and the baby. Quinlan leapt back, hand outstretched, and heaved the clone back with the Force. The child screamed in anguish. The commandos hit the clone with a stun setting. He went limp, and they hauled him out the door. Quinlan tried in vain to calm the struggling boy.

Commander Two-two appeared at his side. "The hostiles are all secured, sir."

"Very good," Quinlan said distractedly. "Now-"

A golden bolt of fury shot into the room at lightning speed, a chilling howl of wrath Quinlan's only warning. The creature leapt, massive jaws aimed at the baby.

Quinlan ended up standing on a table, the infant held as high over his head as possible, when the commandos finally shot the thing with a stunner. He slowly lowered the child. "What was _that_?" he croaked.

Two-two crouched beside the unconscious animal. "I'm not sure, sir." The creature had six legs, wrinkled folds of smelly golden hide, and the most hideous, toothy face Quinlan had ever seen. He was in no hurry to get down from the table. "What _else_ do they have in this place?" he wondered allowed.

Two-two nodded crisply. "We'll check every room, sir."

"Good." Quinlan gingerly dismounted from the table and, giving the creature a wide berth, edged his way around the room to the door. The baby reached both hands wretchedly toward the animal even though he had no chance of touching it across such an incredibly far stretch that was constantly getting longer. His face crumpled in a silent heartbroken wail.

"I have somewhere to be," Quinlan said briskly to the guards. "You can handle this?"

"Yes, sir. We'll give the apartment a thorough scan, probably check the restaurant too, and then handle the prisoners."

The child's agony sawed ruthlessly at the Jedi's Force sense. He pressed a hand to his head. This was a sensitive youngling, apparently very attached to his family, and likely attuned to them at a startling level. "Don't kill them," he ordered.

Two-two tilted his helmeted head questioningly. "Sir?"

"Don't kill them," he repeated. "If this one feels it, he'll be broken for good. Do you understand me? Do not kill any of these prisoners." He shot the golden bulk a sour look. "Not even that."

Two-two seemed at a loss for the first time since Quinlan had met him. "But-what do we do with them, sir?"

Quinlan turned on his heel and strode out. "That's for you to decide." He bore the newly sobbing child through the restaurant, to the curb, and to a nearby speeder rental shop. He cinched the baby into the seat beside him. The child never stopped screaming.

"There there," he said tightly. The sound stirred uncomfortable memories of his own early childhood, the murder of his parents, and how only his Jedi tutor could make everything right and safe again. "We're almost home."

Soon the spires of the Jedi Temple rose above them, so high they appeared to pierce the star-dense sky. Quinlan motored the speeder into a hangar. The baby's sobs echoed desolately in the cavernous space. A maintenance droid hurried stiffly to welcome the Jedi as Quinlan picked up the youngling. His hands tingled as they automatically began to take in memories stored in the fleecy, pale blue onesie. Quinlan tried to fix his eye on the droid and failed.

"See that this is returned to Xed Speeder Rental in the Lower Levels. About three sectors from here."

"I will assure its safe return, Master Vos," the droid intoned politely, though its photoreceptors strayed repeatedly to the baby.

"That's all," Quinlan snapped.

He headed for the youngling quarters as quickly as he could. He had just stepped out of the lift directly opposite them when a human woman dashed through the door. "What are you doing?" she cried. "Give him to me, now!" She snatched the distraught baby from him. He vaguely recognized her as the newest youngling Master, caretaker of Krayt Dragon Clan. Veenna, he thought it was. She held the baby protectively and stared, waiting for an explanation.

He said curtly, "I found him," and backed up a step.

"Found him? But-"

A memory transmitted by contact with the baby's azure onesie caught him before he could think of a reply. _The light of a window silhouettes a human frame in shadow, edged with a corona of gold. He can't see the person's face other than a bright, wide smile meant for him-_ Quinlan rubbed his hands on his robes ineffectually, the cleansing action automatic even though he knew the memories he'd gathered would only fade once they were spent. _A pair of blue hands roll a red ball to him across the floor-_

"Master Vos?" Veenna asked.

He turned and strode away.

"Master Vos!" Veenna called over the baby's wails. "What happened to this youngling? Where was he?"

Quinlan paused at the lift. "I found him," he repeated, and before Veenna could ask more the door sealed behind him. He leaned against it and tried to regain his center of balance. The contact with the Mandalorian youngling, his memories of an idyllic childhood gone forever, slowly faded, but Quinlan was left with the raw, hot flavor of avocadoes at the back of his throat.

Desperate heartbreak stabbed and hacked away at his heart. Everything and everyone he had ever loved- Gone, _gone_,_ GONE_, _**GONE!**_ Anakin Skywalker jolted awake with tears tracking down his cheeks and an answering scream rising in his throat. The vortex of nearly mad grief that swamped him poured from the youngling quarters. _Luke! Leia!_ He half-tumbled off his pallet and sprinted through the Temple's softly lit halls to the horizontal lift tube that would take him to the youngling quarters on the other side of the Room of a Thousand Fountains. He shifted from foot to foot during the ride over, anxiety gnawing at his bones. When he burst into the nursery where Krayt Dragon Clan slept, searing grief smacked him hard enough to make him stagger.

"Veenna!" he called.

She sat in the rocking chair, helplessly cradling a human baby. Anakin stopped when he saw the baby's shock of black hair. Veenna smiled ruefully and jerked her head at two of the cribs that lined the walls.

Luke and Leia both watched the proceedings in distressed confusion. Luke reached a tiny hand through the bars to touch Anakin's hand. He whimpered a feeling of shocked empathy into the Jedi Master's mind. Anakin scooped up his three-month-old son, such a solemn monk of a baby, with a serious blue gaze and hair so pale it may as well not have bothered growing at all. He picked up Leia too: a warrior in the making, willful and vivacious and every inch her mother's daughter. Cradling them, he slid to the ground beside Veenna.

"Master Vos just brought him in fifteen minutes ago," she murmured. "Shh, little one, it's all right. You're safe here."

The baby turned his head and blinked dark eyes shining with tears. "What's your name?" she whispered.

"Kad," he said in a tiny toddler's voice. "Kad Skeer-h-ta."

"Kad?" Luke asked, concerned. Despite the loss Anakin felt from the youngling, almost as strongly as he still felt his own, his heart swelled at Luke's _first word_.

Kad looked appealingly at Veenna, then Anakin. "Boo? Baboo?" His poignant pointedness imparted that he asked for people.

Veenna shook her head slowly. "I'm sorry. I don't know where they are."

Kad looked desperately from her to Anakin again. "La-la? Mril?" "No," Anakin said helplessly. "We-"

Kad threw his head back and screamed. "_BOO! BABOO! LA-LA! MRIL! ORD!_"

Veenna started to her feet convulsively, while Anakin fell back with a choked gasp.

"_BARD! NINE! COR! VOO! AHTEEEEN!_"

"A healer, Anakin, get a healer!" Veenna shouted.

Still holding his own bawling babies, Anakin edged toward the door. There was no way he could bring himself to leave in the face of this youngling's agony. He cast out in the Force to find someone, _anyone_, who could help.

"_COM! DI! JAN! BESS! AD! FIVE! MIRD! BOOOOOO!_" Kad broke into wrenching sobs.

_Don't leave me, don't leave me, please don't leave me!_

"Kad, Kad," Veenna repeated urgently. "Please, little one."

Kad looked up at her, eyes dark holes devoid of hope, and fell silent. The only sounds were Luke and Leia's combined unhappy cries. Veenna met Anakin's eyes, horrified.

"What did he _do_?" Anakin rasped.

Veenna sank into the rocking chair. "You don't know that," she rebuked.

Anakin was in no mood to be chastised by a woman only a scant three years his senior. "_Look _at him," he exclaimed, eyes on Kad, who was as still as a lifeless doll. "Didn't you _hear_ that? Veenna, something awful happened!"

She shook her head obstinately. "I refuse to jump to conclusions. Did you summon a healer?"

Anakin bit back a heated retort. _Right. I'm a good Jedi now._ "Yes, I reached for-"

The door slid open. Vokara Che, Master Healer of the Jedi Order, stepped into the room.

Kad caught a glimpse of her and raised his head. A sudden, relieved cry of "La-la!" leapt from his throat-and died an abrupt death as he realized the new arrival was not the one he had thought she was. His face crumpled. "La-la…."

"Oh no," the elderly Twi'lek healer murmured. She took the unresisting child from Veenna. "I'm sorry, little one. I'm Master Che." She looked at Veenna. "Shall I take him?"

The youngling Master shook her head tiredly. "No. I think I'll keep him. Krayt Dragon Clan could use more members." She vacated the rocking chair for Master Che, who swathed Kad in salving layers of the Force. Veenna leaned against the wall with a data pad on her knees as she created a file for their new arrival. Anakin peered over her shoulder.

Kad (Cad?) Skita Skirta Skir'ta Kad Skir'ta

She glanced at him wearily. "Home planet Coruscant?" He could only shrug. She filled it in. "Age…." She peered at the child. "Twelve to fifteen months."

Anakin, who was no judge of babies of any species but was determined to learn, compared him discreetly with the two he still held. "That old?"

"He's on the small side. Birthday-"

"July 9," Anakin suggested.

"Luke and Leia's birthday?"

"Until you learn the real one, it will do. It's memorable. Empire Day, and all that poodoo."

The look she gave him told him what she thought of the likelihood of finding out anything about this particular youngling. "A year and three months it is." She sighed heavily.

"What's his name?" Master Che whispered.

"Kad Skir'ta," Veenna answered. "Kay-ay-dee."

"A good name," Master Che agreed. "What happened to him?"

Veenna sighed again. "No idea."

It struck Anakin suddenly that this was a remarkably intimate moment among people with little connection: all of them in their sleep clothes, united by exhaustion and compassion for this one heartbroken baby, all unarmed. He had even left his lightsaber under his pillow.

"_That weapon is your life, Anakin. Where is it?" _

"…_Under my pillow, Master." _

"_Oh, Anakin. I swear that you do this on purpose."_

He desperately wanted Obi-Wan back from that mop-up mission to Cato Nemoidia right then, so he could stop the whirling in Anakin's head and make the galaxy fall into place again. Obi-Wan had been a pillar of stability these past few months for his former Padawan still reeling from the betrayal of his most trusted friend and the loss of his wife.

Leia clutched the front of Anakin's sleep shirt in her perfect little hands and nuzzled into it. His heart warmed until it burned as a tranquil flame in his chest, not the devastating inferno it would have been had Sidious had his way. The twins, and Obi-Wan, were Anakin's anchors. Until this storm eased, they would keep him safe and sane.

_And Kad?_ he thought. _What happened to his anchors? That youngling is adrift and so completely alone._

"He's asleep," Master Che whispered.

"Good," Veenna muttered. "He needs his sleep." She reached to take Luke and Leia. "I think we all do." She returned Leia to her crib on the far right of the wall, but moved Luke to the far left, so that the one between them was ready for a different occupant. "I don't think he should be left alone."

Master Che nodded. "I'm staying for the night," she answered.

Kad woke with a jerk. He looked around frantically, then, seeing where he was, buried his face in Master Che's robes and cried bitterly.

"Kad, Kad," Master Che whispered over and over. "Hush, little one. Hush."

The small tenderness was too much. Kad's sobbing screams again grazed on their ears. "BABOO! LA-LA! MRIL!" Anakin and Veenna crouched helplessly on either side of the rocking chair, willing to do anything to help, but unable to provide any sort of comfort.

It was a long, long night.

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><p><strong>Please review. If you have questions, I'll do my best to answer them.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	2. Chapter 2 Mandalore Gone

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 2: Mandalore Gone<p>

The endless, dragging minutes changed to hours, and days. The first thing that morning, Veenna tried to hunt down Quinlan Vos for a more complete explanation, but he had already been redeployed to the Outer Rim. Kad stopped saying the names of those he had lost after the first day. Anakin, Veenna, and Master Che formed a team to help him withstand his aching grief, though his greatest helpmeets were Luke and Leia. After the first two weeks, their mere presence could be relied upon to calm him.

It was twelve days before he smiled. Anakin engaged in all sorts of clowning maneuvers, determined to bring happiness back into his life, and admittedly a little desperate. When at last his antics succeeded, Kad proved to have an infectious laugh and a delightful smile.

"Master!" Anakin yelped in delight. He jumped up from the floor, shedding indignant younglings into Veenna's perturbed arms, and hopped across the room to give Obi-Wan a quick hug.

His former Master returned it briefly, which was unusual but not unexpected. "How are you?" he asked in a low voice, testing the waters. Anakin grinned widely. "Great, now that you're back. Come see them."

Obi-Wan obligingly sank to the floor beside the three younglings. They regarded him solemnly.

"Luke, Leia, Kad, this is Master Obi-Wan Kenobi," Anakin introduced formally.

"Eh," Luke smiled in greeting. "Oh-bee."

Obi-Wan didn't bother to hide his smile. "Hello, Luke. Leia. We meet again. But I don't know you." He looked at Kad.

"He's the one I mentioned when you called," Anakin muttered in his ear.

Obi-Wan smiled at Kad. "Hello, _Kad'ika_."

Kad gasped. He jumped up, crossed the room at a stumbling run, and fell into Obi-Wan's lap. "Soo-coo-ee," he said, lifting his head to look hungrily at Obi-Wan.

"_Su'cuy_," the Jedi Master returned with a rare, rakish smile.

"That's very odd, Anakin," he remarked later as they strolled through the Room of a Thousand Fountains together. "He's Mandalorian. Did you know that?"

Anakin shook his head. Obi-Wan did speak some of the language from the time he'd spent on Mandalore, so he would know.

"_Kad'ika_ is an affectionate nickname. I expect that's what he was called. It means 'little saber.'" Obi-Wan stopped and turned to fully face his friend. His face was very serious. "I'm worried about how he came to be here, Anakin. If I know anything about Mandalorians, they are the least likely people in the galaxy to give a child to the Jedi. Most of them dislike us on principle, and the idea of handing a child over to be raised by strangers is appalling to them. Something terrible must have happened to his family, for him to be here."

Anakin nodded and ground his boot into the blue-graveled path. "We thought as much," he admitted. "But he could have been abandoned, you know. There are a few rotten mujas in every crate," he added, for Obi-Wan was already shaking his head. "How did you know he was Mandalorian?"

"I guessed, and was right. 'Boo' sounds like a child's rendition of '_Buir_,' the Mandalorian word for father or mother. 'Baboo,' by extension, would be '_Babuir_,' or grandparent. He proved my theory quickly enough." Anakin crossed his arms and lowered his head, remembering Kad's pleading screams. "If they abandoned him, then I hope they rot in hell," he muttered in a voice that was almost a growl.

"Anakin!"

"Sorry!" he snapped. He breathed the dark, vengeful clouds that had gathered in his head away. The smoldering wrath gone, only a weary emptiness and a headache remained. "But he loved them so much, I feel like I've been punched in the gut every time he misses them. And he's so sweet, so innocent…." So scarred. Turning to Obi-Wan, he demanded plaintively, "What sort of parent could do that to a youngling? What sort of family?"

Obi-Wan smiled with no warmth or humor. "In a way, I hope he was abandoned. If so, then he's found a better home with us. If not…." He let Anakin complete the thought.

"Then what happened to his family?"

Memories. A word that triggers nostalgia or regret, fond smiles or bitter tears. Memories are a precious thing. The past forms the present. The memories form the being. When they begin to fade, it is the beginning of losing it all.

Krayt Dragon Clan's sleeping room was silent, save for the sleepy snufflings of the half a dozen younglings who dreamed in the cribs that lined the walls. Veenna slept soundly in her chamber next door, exhausted by the demands of the original five younglings, the petulant tears of the latest arrival, and most of all the Amidala twins' new mobility: they had learned to walk and then run in a matter of days, invariably in opposite directions. Had she been more alert she would have woken at the hint of discord that entered the symphony of toddler dreams.

Kad Skir'ta, quiet and easily lost in the shuffle, stirred in his sleep. A dream that he knew was a memory from the Other Place gently asserted itself on his consciousness.

…_Ord in red armor kneels in front of him, holding out his big knife. "Come on, _Kad'ika_. You can do it." _

_He reaches for the knife and grasps it, point down, like Ord shows him. _

"_Good, _Kad'ika_! You're such a big boy!" Mama's voice says warmly. _

_And he wants to see Mama; it's been so long, so he tries to turn to look at her, up at her face. Because he can't remember her face anymore, and can barely make out Ord's. Even their voices sound wrong: not crisp and real on his eardrums, but fake and far away. So he tries to turn, but in the dream he only looks at the knife. Ord's knife, but that's not its name. What's it called? Ord used to love to tell him its name, and how he was meant to use one, but now he can't recall why the knife was so special. He tries to ask, but the dream warps and blurs like he's jumping into hyperspace, but he's never done that either. Has he?… _

…_Baboo holds his arms out, a beaming smile on his face. "Come on, _Kad'ika_. You can do it." _

_He's holding La-la's fingers, and the space between him and Baboo looks like an infinity, but he lets go and steps, steps, stumbles, lifts his feet in rapid clumsiness to keep them moving, falls into Baboo's hands and looks up with a big smile of his own, so proud. And then Mird comes in, squeaking, and he loves it so much he gives it a cookie, and they play in the sheets… _

…_He wakes up from good dreams, and someone's smiling down at him with disbelieving joy, but he can't quite see who it is because of the light behind them. It's his… He can't remember the word, and this scares him. He strains to say the word, so the someone will keep smiling at him and not leave him alone. He tries so hard-_

Kad woke up. Tears trembled on his eyelashes. They were tears of frustration and dread, only he didn't even know what he was scared of. What was the word? Kad knew the someone's special meaning to him, but no amount of headache-inducing thinking could dredge up the Mando word for it, and he didn't know the Basic translation. He had gone too long without speaking Mando. Only that one exchange with Obi weeks ago, then not a word.

He rolled onto his back to gaze at the ceiling above him. His memory projected star-blue pinpricks onto the ceiling, a hologram of the constellations above the place they were going home to someday, so he would remember that Coruscant wasn't home, just a stopover. Only the soft blue of the hall's glowing walls tinted the ceiling here.

Kad struggled to recall the faces of everyone in his family, but none appeared with clarity, only brief flashes. Their names; he'd known those in the dream. He was supposed to repeat the names of those he'd lost. It was the Mando thing to do.

"Ord, Babou, Mir," he whispered to himself, but came up short, frowning. That was wrong. "Ord, Ma, Comdi-" Wrong again. Angry tears pricked his eyes. Angry at himself, for not remembering them. "Ord, Fee, Mrid-" he whispered, low and terrified. It was wrong, it was all wrong!

Silent tears ran down his cheeks. _I'll remember you, so you're eternal._ That promise, spoken by a voice with a familiar accent: rough around the edges, elongated vowels and consonants that ran together, full of sudden jags and swerves in pitch and tone. His own Basic pronunciations were taking on the more mellow, flat timbre of the average human Jedi. The voice of someone without a people, without a culture.

He couldn't remember them. They were fading ever away, their memories soon to be oblivion even as they were. He'd failed them.

"Luke, Leia, Ani, Obi, Masser Che," Kad whispered tearfully to the unforgiving night, the litany a despairing offering to the husky-voiced speaker he had let down. They were the wrong names. But they were the only names he knew.

* * *

><p><strong>Is anyone reading this? What do you think?<strong>

**mad'ika**


	3. Chapter 3 Years

**SPOILER ALERT! If you're reading my story "The New Guy", then DO NOT READ THIS YET! It contains MAJOR plot spoilers.**

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 3: Years<p>

Despite his wretched arrival, Kad soon began to fit into Temple life, and six months after the event he seemed to have become a happy youngling. Luke and Leia remained his support base, while he also expressed great affection for 'Ani,' 'Obi,' Master Che, and Ferris. He got along well with the other younglings in Krayt Dragon Clan once they began to arrive.

He, Luke, and Leia got up to no end of mischief. They made quite a team, according to Veenna, and soon were dubbed the Triumvirate.

* * *

><p>Grandmaster Yoda's favorite activity by far was working with the youngest Jedi in the Temple, the toddlers and younglings too little to have their minds clouded by preconceptions. Now that the war was finally, <em>finally<em> over, he could once again focus his attention fully on his Order, his Masters and Knights and apprentices and younglings, particularly his own Padawan, Rube Dune. But today was for the younglings.

He led the twenty younglings of Krayt Dragon Clan in a serious line into the gardens. Light the penetrating gold of an autumn midmorning set the colors of the half-wild greenery into splendid relief. Yoda turned to face the row solemnly at a crossroads of the winding paths. The little ones mirrored his focused attention in that wonderful way young Jedi had. "Learn today, you will." He tapped his gimer stick on the soil for emphasis. He gestured them closer. They clustered around him, waiting for a revelation or a secret from Master Yoda. _A surprise I have for you, younglings_, he thought gleefully. "Learn today, you will," he repeated quietly. "But _catch you first, I must!_" He sprang like a bullfrog in the direction of a Mon Cal girl named Cilghal, who squealed and scampered in the opposite direction. The clan scattered with elated shrieks.

Yoda chased them endlessly, using more and more ineffective means to attempt to corral them. He whacked at their legs with his stick and howled like a Kowakian monkey-lizard, tried to jump on them from above only to inevitably sprawl on the path or in a nearby patch of garden, never closer than a meter. The wild burst of play spent their two- and three-year-old energy.

_Know a thing or two about younglings, I do_, Yoda congratulated himself as he snuck up behind Leia Amidala. It was about time to declare an end to the game. Just as he was about to tap her soundly on the shins and pronounce her out, she spun around and bopped him on the nose. He fell back, just a little bit startled. Her face broke into a sunny smile. "I got you, Master!" she crowed.

And what could he say to that? "Out, I am!" he declared. "Over, the game is. Bow to your superior sneakiness, I do." He stood and dipped gracefully to Leia, who smiled. She was a confident little thing, that one, and very strong in the Force.

Luke and Kad ran over to join her. She and her brother easily outshined all the others in their year in the area of sheer potential. It worried him a little. Not that he thought they would show off-well, maybe Leia, occasionally. But for one such as Kad Skir'ta, their closest friend and a powerful Force-sensitive in his own right, standing too close to their bright lights could dim his own by comparison. Kad already had confidence issues Yoda had noticed in the introductory weapons classes he was beginning to teach them.

_His own bright star he is, but see it he might not_, the Grandmaster thought as he huddled them around a Rigelian Iris for the beginning of the lesson. _Too dim, he might think he is. See themselves as I see them, I wish they all could. Luminous beings etched in light- Clear the Force is now. Brighter than ever my Jedi are._

He gestured one clawed hand at the Rigelian Iris. One of the marbled red and white blooms opened its throat shyly to the cobalt sky, while the other stayed tight shut. "Feel them, can you, hmm?" He peered at the intent little faces around him and nodded approvingly. "Feel the stir? Feel the ebb and flow of life? The current of the Force?"

"That one's sleeping, Master," Cilghal said, just as three hands reached out and touched the closed bud simultaneously. A surging, bright release of the Force-and the flower burst open to its height of springtime glory as if startled awake. Yoda jerked back and snuffled in surprise. The perpetrators, who were of course none other than Luke and Leia Amidala and Kad Skir'ta, tumbled backwards in fits of delighted giggling.

Yoda felt a smile creeping across his own face, and chuckled gently. "Bold you are, young ones," he said warmly as the three humans sat up. "Good Jedi you will be, bringing life with _enthusiasm_. But let it sleep a while longer we should, perhaps?"

Leia shook her head firmly. "It's time for it to get up."

He peered at the flower, fished into the crystalline Force, and found…she was right. They were right. The flower was indeed overdue. _Much joy and trouble these children will bring_, he thought. _Never let me forget this, will she._ "Right, you are," he announced.

"Wait'll I tell Obi and Ani!" she yelped happily.

It was a moment none present were ever allowed to forget. Not that they wanted to.

* * *

><p>The years spun by, heady with the growth of the next generation. Every day the younglings of Krayt Dragon Clan seemed to come a step closer to flowering into the fullness of their brightest potential. Character-building lessons surprised them every day. After all, they were being raised by Jedi, and Jedi are by definition as dictated by veterans of the Clone Wars-as well as peacekeepers, the embodiment of justice, and crazy-teachers who never miss a good lesson.<p>

* * *

><p>The training exercises of Jedi younglings never ceased to enthrall Anakin. Once they reached ten or so, the seemingly impossible feats stopped striking him as amazing and instead became "things we do." However, something about young children running vertically up a wall, dodging projectiles blindfolded, lifting objects five meters away just by moving a hand really drove home just how powerful and alien Force-sensitives were.<p>

He and Obi-Wan watched Krayt Dragon Clan's training exercise from the edge of the room. This was one of the youngling/Padawan obstacle courses, a fairly simple setup of twisting balance beams, ramps, greased walls, trampolines, and a thick wire that stretched over a padded pit.

Master Cin Drallig, the primary lightsaber instructor, faced the avid young Initiates. "Today's exercise centers on cooperation. In small groups, you will fight and deactivate ten seeker drones. This will be blindfolded and nonverbal. Do I have any volunteers for the first round?"

The younglings waited in silence for someone to step forward. At last, Leia raised her hand. "I'll do it, Master Drallig."

Drallig nodded approval. "Anyone else? I'd like a team of three here."

"I will, Master," Kad said.

"So will I," Luke volunteered a heartbeat later.

Drallig raised his eyebrows good-naturedly. "The Triumvirate strikes again. Come here, then." He blindfolded the seven-year-old twins and eight-year-old Kad with light but impenetrable strips of cloth.

They moved carefully to open ground between the series of trampolines and the polished four meter wall. Their knees bent into ready stances as they settled into the hyper-alert silence of listening. Drallig activated the drones with a remote. The ten gray metal orbs rose into the air, a red light flushing on in each of their photoreceptors.

Anakin leaned forward unconsciously.

Obi-Wan smiled. "They'll do fine."

"I know they will. I want to see better. I love watching them together."

The older man nodded, amused by his open anticipation, but a movement at the corner of his eye caught his attention. The door slid open just enough for R2-D2 to waddle into the room, as quiet as could be. Obi-Wan glanced at Anakin. He hadn't noticed.

"Begin," Master Drallig said, and pressed the commencement sequence on the drones' remote. The drones buzzed to life and zipped about the room. Their programming took queues from movement. The key to beating them was to react so quickly they didn't have time to fire off a stinging pseudo blaster bolt into you.

The Triumvirate was perfectly still. Then, as quickly as if they had rehearsed it, they whirled apart. Kad ran up the close wall, flipped upside down, and landed on one of the trampolines, from which he sprang high into the air in a somersault. Leia shadowed him, deflecting the blaster bolts from the drones. Luke darted away to hide in the shadow of the wall. The drones swarmed toward the promising targets.

"Good strategy, flawless execution," Anakin commented enthusiastically to Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan glanced again at the stealthy astromech, who inched ever closer to the position that would grant him the ideal angle. The droid's dome swiveled as he made eye contact with Obi-Wan. The Jedi Master raised a hand slightly in silent greeting. His secrecy assured, R2 continued his furtive advance toward the optimal position.

The drones descended in a buzzing hoard on Leia and Kad, who pulled his own lightsaber now and deflected their attacks. The two moved in concert, never impeding the other's attack or defense, all in a silent communion. Not yet, not yet…. _Now._

Kad and Leia dove headfirst off the last trampoline. The drones flooded after them in mindless pursuit just as Luke arced out from the shadow of the wall behind them into their midst. His foot connected with one, which he used as an opposing force that let him swing his body in a circle, lightsaber striking five of the drones into inactivity.

Anakin swung to face Obi-Wan, an almost maniacal grin on his face. R2, visible from the corner of Anakin's eye, froze. "Did you see that? That was genius! Using the drone as a _pivot_! I wouldn't have thought of that! Would you have thought of that?"

Obi-Wan admitted that he would not have thought of that. Even Master Drallig looked impressed with their progress so far. Leia and Kad turned their tumbles into shoulder rolls that bounced them back onto their feet fluidly. Their expressions under the blindfolds were inward, saturated in the calm fury of the Force.

The three converged on a single point. Luke and Kad dropped to their knees, hands joined to form a platform. Leia launched herself off it into the air and slashed two more of the drones away. The boys were already moving before she began to fall down. They came from opposite sides in a perfectly coordinated attack that blocked all avenues of escape for the remaining three drones.

Anakin actually felt tears prick at his eyes. They worked so beautifully together, always in tandem, always responding to one another's maneuvers a fraction of an instant before they were made. He dropped into the Force himself to view their actions through its diamond lens. The room became an interconnected web of light, much like a crystal in its structure. Luke, Leia, and Kad blazed like suns that shared one orbit and were inexorably drawn into a unified dance. A connection spanned between the three of them, firm but fluid, intentions and feelings running their continuous course down the three-way Force bond. The harmony transfixed him enough for R2 to speed across his plane of vision unnoticed. The droid let out a wheedle of satisfaction when he at last reached his destination.

Just as the Triumvirate leaped into the air, lightsabers aimed to skewer one drone each, R2 flashed a picture with a triumphant feroo.

The bright burst of light blinded Anakin, but he spun to face the right direction. Through the multicolored blur in front his eyes, he made out the squat shape. "That does it!" he hollered. "R2! Come here!"

The astromech made a noise remarkably like blowing a raspberry, shot a copy of the photo at him like a bullet, and sped away. Anakin very nearly gave chase.

"Master Skywalker!" Drallig called. "Please keep it down. We're having a lesson."

Chagrinned, he jerked to a halt. "Right. Jedi _Master_," he muttered to himself as he returned to Obi-Wan's side with as much dignity as he could muster. Magenta spots danced in front of his eyes still, but the disabled shells of three drones, each marked with a satisfying char line, lay like skulls on the ground at the Triumvirate's feet.

The children pulled off their blindfolds with hands that trembled with fatigue from their brief but taxing exertions. They executed weary bows to Master Drallig, who clapped slowly. "Magnificent cooperation, younglings. _That's_ what I aim to see from each of you, no matter what combinations I throw you in. Astute assessment, decisive agreement on strategy, and swift, coordinated execution. You have passed this test, younglings Amidala and Skir'ta." He smiled at their upturned faces, beaming with success but thoroughly worn out. "Why don't you rest for a while over there?" He pointed to where Anakin and Obi-Wan waited, now seated on the floor. Anakin examined the picture. R2 had an eerie talent for capturing the moment exactly as it was. The kids were caught midleap, a triad that bore down like avenging angels on the hapless drones. Their expressions were identical: mouths turned down at the corners just slightly, like they saw a flaw in the web of the galaxy and had to right it. It was a disturbingly adult expression, and R2's photo captured the essence of their youth as well: their lithe children's bodies juxtaposed dramatically but subtly against the facial expressions illuminated by the lightsabers. And off to the side were he and Obi-Wan. His Master stood easily with his hands in his sleeves, the wise benevolence of a sage in his tranquil demeanor. Anakin leaned forward, taut with anticipation, eyes alight.

He sighed and grudgingly slid the picture into his pocket. He would copy it onto his datapad. Just like the seventy others on there. "I never should have given him that camera," he muttered.

Suddenly the kids were there, with Kad falling into his lap while the twins warred over Obi-Wan. "Did we do okay, Ani?" the little boy asked, twisting to look up at his friend's face hopefully. His eyes were a dark nut brown, shot with lighter amber rays around the pupil. It was like looking at an evening sandstorm that obscured the sun. Anakin could swear he had seen those eyes before….

"You did great," he answered and pulled Kad into a hug. "The galaxy had better watch out. You three will give justice a new face."

Kad leaned his head against Anakin's shoulder with a sigh. "I only got one. But we did plan it that way. Luke's the quietest, so he ambushed them, and Leia's the lightest, so we threw her into the air. I'm the fastest, so-"

"You were brilliant," Anakin vowed with such conviction that Kad grinned up at him.

"Thanks, Ani."

Anakin leaned against the wall, Kad still resting in a hug. Luke and Leia each rested in a crook of Obi-Wan's arms. Maybe attachment was forbidden. Maybe he had sworn it away forever. These kids, though, made him wonder just how attachment differed from love. They were as deeply connected as any beings could be, just as he was with Obi-Wan. It was something he had yet to figure out. Where did love end and attachment begin, and how could such closeness ever be a bad thing?

* * *

><p>The taking of Padawans is a serious business, as all Jedi know. The relationship is symbiotic, a mutual exchange of commitment and faith. A Master and Padawan must share a deep trust for the arrangement to work properly. The Padawan must be willing to bow to the Master's superior experience and judgment even when it feels wrong, because that is how they will learn. The Master must be willing to acknowledge and consider the Padawan's objections and innate wisdom even when their plan feels flawless, because that is how they learn. They must both be willing to die for one another without even a first thought, for that is how both might survive. The connection goes deep, near to the core, and is forged through painstaking effort on both sides. These bonds, while not often lifelong, leave their echoes on the hearts of both parties forever. Often they translate into a permanent intimacy that resembles that of parent and child. Most Masters would not say they are their apprentice's parent. They are a mentor, a guide. But Masters are the closest thing to parents any Jedi has.<p>

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><p>"Will you?" Anakin pressed.<p>

Obi-Wan raised his eyes from the Corellian pasta he was trying in vain to enjoy undisturbed. "Anakin, it is an extremely personal decision. You of all people ought to know that."

Anakin leaned across the table so that his nose was a centimeter from Obi-Wan's. "None of those kids," he said significantly, "are going to the Agri Corps."

Obi-Wan shook his head at the absurdity of such a statement. "Of course not. Anakin, are we talking about the same children? Have you seen those three lately? They're the best in their year."

"Sometimes the best go unnoticed. _You_ of all people ought to know _that_."

Obi-Wan pointedly speared his pasta with a fork and was otherwise unresponsive.

Anakin decided it was time for a more sideways tactic. "Fine," he said with a sigh. "You're right. I think Ferris wants Leia, I can take Kad if I need to, and Luke will get a Master eventually." He gazed wistfully over Obi-Wan's head. "Maybe Quinlan Vos."

Obi-Wan's head came up with a jerk. "_Quinlan Vos?_" he demanded, blown away by the mere idea. "You think that reckless self-absorbed nerf herder would be a good Master for our Luke?"

Anakin shrugged passively. "Someone's got to do it."

Obi-Wan stared at him, borderline horrified, then let out a wordless exclamation of indignation and returned resolutely to his pasta. "Anakin, I merely meant it's my choice to make. I have considered this for quite awhile, and I mean to take Luke. There's no need to threaten me in such a cruel and unusual fashion."

Anakin shrugged and passed Obi-Wan a chunk of his warm, buttery Bread in silent apology, though he was secretly pleased with the results.

"So I take Luke," Obi-Wan said after a minute. Even he was not immune to trying to plan the kids' futures. "Ferris takes Leia, and you take Kad?"

Anakin shook his head. "I wouldn't be a good Master for Kad. You know me. Either I'd been too easy on him, or I'd overcompensate and be way too hard. Do you think I could talk Master Che into taking him?" "Don't talk her into anything," Obi-Wan said gently. "Kad needs better than that."

Anakin nodded, but he made a mental note to suggest the option to the Master Healer.

Obi-Wan studied him. "You know, Anakin, you really ought to take a Padawan of your own. You'd be surprised by how fulfilling it is."

"I have been thinking about it," he admitted. "Maybe. Later, though. I want to get Kad safely apprenticed first. I know I can count on you and Ferris, but whether I can trust Master Che with this remains to be seen."

* * *

><p>Kad woke with an unpleasant curdling in his middle, as if his stomach was slowly fermenting. It was Empire Day. He crossed to the window and looked out at the sun rising over Coruscant. The traditional banners had already been hoisted on top of buildings and at the corners of walkways. They were plain black squares of cloth with no ornamentation, only the word EMPIRE printed in white, a simple reminder for the Republic of the direction it had nearly taken nine years ago, and a warning for the future. <em>I'm ten.<em> He didn't feel ten. He felt too young to be eligible as a Padawan, and with a sinking feeling wondered how many more times he would look out this window before he was sent to the Agri Corps.

Leia tapped him sharply through the Force. He winced at the harsher-than-normal feeling. It was only to be expected that on the day set aside for meditation and reflection Leia would be annoyed. She hated inaction even more than Anakin did.

Kad dressed slowly and spent a few minutes just turning his lightsaber over in his hands. He had already built a real one, as had Luke and Leia. All Jedi built lightsabers before the age of ten nowadays. He supposed it was a throwback from the war: the need to have a weapon at the ready as soon as you stood a chance of facing combat.

The door opened. "Are you coming or what?" Leia demanded impatiently. Luke peered around her.

"Coming," Kad muttered. He followed them to the dining hall, which buzzed with easy morning conversation. The cafeteria droids were serving Richazi triclaw buns, one of his favorites, but even that couldn't coax his edgy stomach into anything resembling hunger.

"Happy birthday, Kad, Luke, Leia," Himesh Marus, a male Togruta Kad's age, called from a nearby table where he sat with several other younglings they knew.

"Thanks," Luke responded.

"Sit with us?"

Before Luke could say yes, Kad interrupted quickly, "No, we'd better eat with Obi and Ani today. We didn't yesterday." Leia gave him a sideways look from her brown eyes, but for once didn't pass comment.

Once they had found a less crowded table, Luke said, "How long you think before you're a Padawan?"

Kad poked at his red-swirled bun. "You know no one really makes Padawan when they're ten."

"Rube Dune did," Leia countered immediately. "Master Qui-Gon did. Ani was nine."

Kad took a bite of his bun to give himself time for form an answer. It snapped appealingly on his tongue like it was filled with hyperactive sparks from a campfire, the biting flavor reminiscent of the nasty triclaw green whose meat it was. "I'm just not sure anyone would want me as their Padawan," he finished, glancing down at the table.

What?" Luke exclaimed, genuinely shocked. "Why would you think that? I'll bet everyone will want you!"

Kad shrugged and started into his Gartro egg omelet. The diced roba and Ojomian onion filling made it just about as spicy as he liked his food-though he wondered if he should have gotten something sweeter to calm his uneasy stomach.

"Kad, what is it?" Leia asked, staunch with command but pliant with concern.

Kad looked up at his two best friends. "I just-" he struggled to put his feeling to words. "I'm just not sure any Master would want me."

"But _why_?" Leia demanded.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't think of a reason. He wasn't as strong in the Force as some-but he had an accurate enough self-assessment to know he was one of the stronger students in their year. He had an unnerving edge when he fought, a sort of primal focus that whispered of the dark-but the dark side was gone, and his training in the basics of Vaapad had erased his early concerns. He wasn't confident enough, he didn't have enough initiative, he thought too much-but those were just excuses.

He reached into himself for the reason, dredged his mental depths, and at last wrenched his subconscious rationale from the dark recesses of his mind. It squirmed like a cave-dwelling fish exposed to blinding light. _I'm just not good enough. _He turned the thought over and over. _Whatever I am, it's just not good enough. _It didn't make sense, had no logical grounding that he could fathom, and yet when he thought it experimentally his heart seized with pained conviction. _I'm not good enough. Not to be a Padawan, anyway._

In the end, all he could do was shake his head. "I really don't know." "You'll be a Padawan before the end of the year," Leia predicted fiercely. "Just wait."

Luke looked over Kad's shoulder. "I guess before the day is over." Kad turned to see Master Che wending her way in their direction. She moved as gracefully as ever. Even when she was throwing someone across the room to get them out of her way, she had a natural fluidity about her. She stopped in front of them. "Kad Skir'ta, I ask you to be my Padawan," she said formally and completely without preamble.

A meek thrill ran through Kad's veins at the same time that he felt vaguely sick. It was true. This he wasn't good enough for. "Master Che, I'm not a healer," he protested. He had an average penchant for healing, more than Leia, a little more than Luke, but probably less than Master Kenobi. Master Che merely twitched her lekku in a shrug. "Well, we'll have to alter the usual arrangements a little, obviously," she allowed, but it obviously mattered very little to her. "I'll have to go on regular missions more, and you'll have to train as a healer also. If you accept."

Kad lowered his head, a little overwhelmed. Vokara Che had never taken a formal Padawan before. She trained every healer at one point or another, but never in the intimate capacity of Master to apprentice. She was rumored to have exacting standards that simply could not be met by any other than a healing prodigy.

The one known being who might have surpassed her expectations was a clone, a veteran of the old Clone Wars, named Fib Severn. He was the single Jango Fett clone known to be Force-sensitive-a genetic mutation or the will of the Force, depending on whom you asked-and had a rather impressive healing ability. Unfortunately, he far exceeded the age limitations set for acceptance into the Jedi Order. He was already thirteen by the time Master Che was aware of him-physically and mentally twenty-seven-and his chances of admittance were considered so poor that it was never even brought up in Council. Master Che still mentioned him sometimes with a sting of regret in her voice and a deliberate barb for Mace Windu, whom she regarded as instrumental in preventing Fib's admittance merely for his voicing an opinion to Obi-Wan in private conversation. Kad on no level compared to Fib when it came to raw healing potential. If anyone, he would have thought she'd consider Cilghal, who was the most promising young healer in the Temple, and the best to come along in quite awhile.

"Master, what about Cilghal?"

"I'm not asking Cilghal," she countered gently. "Master Caudle has expressed an interest in Cilghal. I'm asking Kad Skir'ta. I'm asking you." He lowered his head to stare at his clasped hands, wondering whether he would ever feel comfortable with a healing crystal between them. Then he looked up, and the relief edged in giddy happiness surged in. "I accept, Master."

"Good," she smiled broadly. "I hoped you would." Her eyes shifted to his hair and narrowed determinedly. She slid onto the bench next to him. "This might take awhile."

Kad sat still while she twisted and kinked his hair into something resembling a braid. She muttered in disgust at the uneven, knotty strand that resulted. "I'll learn. Get the rest of that cut. It is getting a bit long."

Kad smiled across at Luke and Leia, who both looked at his disaster of a braid as if it was the most wonderful thing they had ever seen. "Yes, Master," he answered, and it felt right.

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><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	4. Chapter 4 Padawan, Not Paragon

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 4: Padawan, Not Paragon<p>

The day after his birthday, Kad woke early and arrived at the Halls of Healing a good half hour before Master Che had told him to be there. He wiped his sweaty palms on the inside of his over-robe and settled into one of the window ledges to wait for her arrival. There was no way he was going to disappoint his Master today.

The Healing Halls combined two very different aspects, the Force and technology. The main hall was tiled in aqua and jade and rose shades, lined with tall windows that let in shafts of yellow sunlight. Cots lined the hall for those who came for aid with lacerations or pulled muscles, while small bare cells were set off for those with more pressing ailments. Only minimal technology was used here. Healing crystals were the primary tools. Off the main wing were the more advanced machines, including over a hundred bacta tanks and highly refined surgical droids. Rooms off this sector assumed a more sterilized, hospital-type feel, with machines that monitored vital processes inserted in the walls. Force healing was much the preferred method.

Unfortunately, that was also the part Kad was worst at. He could read diagnostics better than most because of years of association with Master Che. He thought he could pick up on the ins and outs of medicine and surgery quickly enough. Healing, though, was not something you could get by in. Either you had the aptitude or you didn't. The talent was elusive. Midi-chlorian count seemed not to matter; Ani, the strongest Force-sensitive alive, couldn't heal a nosebleed to save his life. Cilghal, whose power rated a mere six on a scale of ten, could soothe pain just by touching.

"Kad! Good." He jumped up when Master Che swept in to join him. The sun illuminated her finely lined blue skin. She was 232, but still quick and alert. "I have a few decades in me yet," she was known to remark caustically when someone brought up her age. She looked so tall now, a great Master, a living legacy. How could he possibly live up to her standards?

"Master, I'm ready." Kad's heart beat loudly in his ears, but his hands were no longer sweating excessively. That, at least, he could control.

Master Che gestured gallantly ahead of her. "Well, then. Let's see what you can do." He followed her to one of the Spartan cells where a patient waited. Leb, a rather accident-prone Twi'lek Knight, smiled awkwardly at them. He lay on his back on the table, waist high to Master Che. His lekku tips thrashed with embarrassment.

"Let's start with something simple," Master Che said as she pressed the door control to seal the room. "Heal his broken wrist."

A sweat broke out on Kad's forehead. Simple? "Master, I think-" Master Che slapped an annoyed hand to her forehead. "You're right. I'm sorry."

Kad relaxed a little.

_You're just a beginner. Let's do some mild burns instead and work our way up._

"You need a healing crystal."

Anxiety gathered again at the pit of his stomach. _No, Master, that's not what you're supposed to say!_ _How can you be so dense?_

Oblivious, the Twi'lek healer felt about in her pockets until she produced a cerulean blue healing crystal. She held it out with a smile. "This is yours. My best crystal."

Kad took it and examined the clear sheen of its facets. The shade matched Coruscant's noon sky almost exactly-but this wasn't her best, he remembered suddenly. She had given Fib Severn her best healing crystal back when the war ended. The crystal with the strongest affinity, the smoothest magnification, she reserved for the most promising student. Only it wasn't Fib who was her student, it was Kad, Kad Skir'ta who had to fix Leb's broken wrist. He swallowed and willed serenity through his body, especially to his quivering nerve endings and churning stomach. "Thank you, Master."

He cupped his hands around the crystal and felt for it in the Force. It appeared in his mind's eye as a point of least resistance in the tapestry of the room. The Force slid into and through it effortlessly. Shining blue lighted the insides of his eyelids. The stone glowed like he held a star between his hands.

"All right. Show me." Master Che smiled encouragingly at him.

He turned to Leb. _I can do this._ The thought was soundless, serene, a Jedi stating what was about to become reality. He walked to Leb's side, looked down at the wrist twisted at an odd angle, felt the hot pain centered around a snapped bone. His resolve faltered. _I think I can. I hope I can._ The crystal's edges cut into his hands as he squeezed it. _Master, I'll try._ But all the voices in his memory admonished him in a chorus: _"There is no try."_ _But I can do this!_ he cried at them. _I have to!_

A deep breath and he plunged headfirst into the unceasing otherworld of the Force. The mundane messages his eyes and ears fed him fell away like the feeble illusions they were, and the enduring truth spread out before him. And there was Leb, a particular ripple in that radiant ocean, and there was his wrist, a darker red whirlpool that disrupted the natural rhythms of his body. Eyes closed, Kad touched the wrist gently to probe for the nature of the injury. Not a clean break, but a nasty web of splinters and fractures that extended halfway down his forearm and even into the delicate bones of the hand.

"What happened?" he asked.

"I…. Master Xan was helping me with my hand-to-hand, and, well…."

"Did she step on it?"

Leb shrank in on himself. "No. I did," he admitted, suitably mortified. Kad felt rather than saw Master Che's eyebrows rise. "That's a new low, Leb, even for you."

"I know. I'm such a klutz."

"The worst," his Master agreed brightly.

"It's a wonder the Council keeps me around," Leb muttered miserably, head tails drooping.

"You may be a klutz, Leb, but you're our klutz. Go on, Kad."

Feeding the Force through the crystal was a simple matter. Sending it just a bit farther and harnessing it there shouldn't be too bad.

Kad marshaled his forces and zeroed in on the main break. Pulses of energy followed his lead. He willed the broken bone to knit itself, the bruised tendons to ease. But the Force wouldn't do what he wanted it to. It slipped, diverted, wouldn't reach far enough. Kad gritted his teeth and tried to relax and channel the healing. He was a conduit, nothing more. Still the bone wouldn't knit properly. What should have taken less than a minute consumed five. It felt like he was trying to use swollen, clumsy hands for a job that required small, dexterous fingers. The strain ate away at his strength. He moved on to a nasty compound fracture. A work of finesse to fix that. He tried, he really did. Nothing flowed anymore. The Force turned to syrup, sullen and rebellious.

Leb muttered in discomfort at the odd crawling sensation in his forearm. Laboriously Kad worked his way from one crack to the next, pushing and straining and fumbling like an amateur.

When he dropped out of the Force, he panted with the effort of it. The room was silent. He risked a look at Master Che. She was trying not to frown. "Thank you for that informative session, Kad. I'll work out a suitable training regimen, and tomorrow we'll get started." So clipped. Trying to hide her disappointment.

He stood and bowed lower than necessary, unable to meet her eyes. "Master." As he left, he fought back tears.

_I should have known I'd fail you in the end. There is only do. And I can only try. Try means nothing._

* * *

><p>Master Che watched Kad's retreating back. Retreat. He wanted to get away from her piercing hawk-bat's gaze. She looked back at Leb, who held up the arm and twisted it experimentally. He winced at a sharp prick of pain, glanced guiltily at her, and assured quickly, "It feels a lot better now."<p>

Wordlessly she stretched out a hand which hovered over his arm. A clumsily healed main break. Many half-knitted fractures. Inflamed tissue like a missed beat in the easy symphony of a healthy body. An ache from the bones' unnecessary exertions to mend themselves. Sloppy. Untaught.

Mediocre.

Leb glanced up at her, almost ashamed to witness Kad's distress and her disappointment. She withdrew her own orange healing crystal and set about doing the job properly.

Disappointment curled in her like a bitter acid. She shouldn't have expected more. Kad was many things, but a natural healer was not one of them. She'd known that when she approached him.

_What did I expect? Magic and miracles?_ she wondered. No. Not really. But she'd hoped for them anyway. His maladroit efforts had been almost painful to observe. Healing should not cause discomfort. It was a balm, a relief of the hurt.

_What did I want?_

She returned to her private office, sat on the meditation pad, and turned the crystal over and over in her fingers.

_Fib._

A paragon, that one. The quintessence of potential healing prowess. Healing came so naturally to him he had done small mendings for years before knowing he was Force-sensitive.

The pall of regret and resentment that so often accompanied thoughts of the clone returned now. It wasn't _fair_. He had such promise, and the Council didn't take him because of an ancient, nonsensical law. Worse, they had every reason to break that law: a precedent in the form of Anakin, a pressing need for more healers, a way to find at least one of their mass-produced soldiers a real home and start to heal the festering wound left by the paradoxical Jedi-led slave army. And Mace Windu threw it back in her face with a curt "he's too old."

_He would have been our best healer_, she thought angrily. _I'm sure of it. I could have trained him and had a worthy Padawan-_ She caught herself with a sickening jolt. _What am I thinking?_ A worthy Padawan. Worthy.

The memory of Kad Skir'ta's swiftly retreating form, so tight with shame and sorrow, flashed before her eyes with a resonating pang. This was little Kad, who'd cried to her all those years ago, who first learned meditation on her knee and whose rare carefree smiles could light up the whole Temple. _Kad, my Padawan._ She nodded firmly to herself. Kad her Padawan. Fib the unfulfilled potential.

The healing crystal glistened softly in her fingers, just the slightest hint of a glow as she hesitated on the brink of meditation. _Kad, my Padawan._ She thought again of Fib, felt again the harsh regret. _Was this a mistake?_

* * *

><p>Anakin had told Obi-Wan he would take a Padawan. So he looked. He watched the classes of the older Initiates, particularly the sparring practices, but also the Force classes and the courses in unarmed combat. His attention was not unusual. He watched classes often. Luke, Leia, and Kad were even in some of the Force use lessons with the slightly older children, and everyone was used to his habitual observation of the three. Due to the regularity of his presence, none of the students expected him to be looking for a Padawan, and so there was no irritating showing off.<p>

As he leaned on the rail of the observation balcony above one of the dojos, he caught himself comparing the Initiates' lightsaber work to Kad's, Luke's, and Leia's. Unfair, again. The Triumvirate outshone most of their peers with their quick, inventive, at times dazzling swordsmanship. There were perhaps a dozen younglings aged eleven and twelve drilling on the mats. Some of them were good. A few were very good.

He toyed briefly with the idea of taking a-well, _bad_ Padawan just for the experience of it, but decided that someone would not come out of that pairing alive, since one of them would kill the other out of sheer frustration. _Best take a good one the first time and give myself a break_, he concluded. _I can go all Master Yoda on myself once I've got the hang of it._

"Good idea," agreed a voice beside him. Ferris blinked at him from less than a foot away, perched on the balcony rim as if he had always been there.

Anakin flinched, despite years of these sudden apparitions. "Blast it, Ferris, can't you warn me? Honk or something."

Ferris tilted his head. Black and silver striped shimmersilk hair shifted on his shoulders. "Honk? But you would fall off the balcony and break your head," he said, perplexed as to why Anakin would desire so inauspicious an outcome.

"I just want a warning."

Ferris shook his head sadly. "I just don't understand you," he said with such thorough confusion that Anakin had to laugh.

"I swear, Ferris, you're one of a kind."

Ferris sighed and rested his chin in his long-fingered hands. "I know." Shaking his head in amusement, Anakin returned his attention to the sparring Initiates below, though he was careful to keep Ferris in his peripheral vision. His friend was definitely a strange one, and he still found himself thinking that the Firrerreo was more suited to a fevered dream or a Force vision than the mundane realm of everyday life. Subconsciously, he was surprised that Ferris had appeared to him perched on the balcony rail and not levitating in the open area over the dojo floor a good fifteen meters below.

"Any advice for me, Ferris?" he asked playfully.

"Yes," Ferris answered, and pointed across his line of sight. "Her." Anakin blinked and sighted down Ferris's finger to see a tall red-haired human girl of twelve. He knew her, vaguely. Mara Jade disliked Luke for no particular reason that Anakin could see. She simply seemed put off by his very existence. The two of them rubbed one another the wrong way whenever they met. He almost voiced this to Ferris, but got caught up in watching her spar with fellow human Kyp Durron.

Her style was nimble but direct. Although she was fast, she used her relative speed to go directly for the kill instead of coming in at a glancing angle, as many of the quicker ones her age tended to. Her blade work was perhaps too abrupt and segmented for Ataru, which he figured was the form she favored. Impatience and nerves jangled away in her Force presence. He had spent enough time around twelve-year-old Initiates to recognize the feelings of on-broken-transparisteel dread younglings got when they were a few weeks shy of their thirteenth birthday.

He looked skeptically at Ferris. "Isn't she a little…too…."

"Much like you? Probably." Ferris cocked his head as though listening. "But it would be good for both of you. And she does need a Master."

Anakin watched Mara for a few more minutes, dubious. She was strong, perhaps on Kad's level, though her power was more raw and unfocused despite her advantage of almost two years. He rolled the idea around in his mind. _Take a Padawan? Take Mara Jade as my Padawan?_

He spent the next few days watching her. Was this someone he wanted to have constantly by his side for the next decade? If nothing else, she had spirit. She really did remind him a bit of himself in his early adolescence, all eagerness and impatience and temper. In the end, it was that similarity that did it. _I'll give her a chance. It's not like anyone else has_, he decided.

Mara was just leaving her lightsaber class when Anakin approached her. She dipped in a bow but watched him curiously. Anakin opened his mouth but was nearly struck dumb by a sudden awkwardness. He had just noticed that her eyes were green. He hadn't known that. It seemed very wrong to be asking her to commit to such a lasting relationship when he hadn't even known what color her eyes were. Nevertheless, he forged stubbornly ahead. _It's not like I'm asking her to marry me- Oh, Force forbid. Get on with it._

"How would you like to be my Padawan?" he asked.

She stared at him. "Really?" He nodded mutely. At least she wasn't breathy with excitement, but rather sounded warily interested. She blinked, but nodded. "Y-yes, Master Skywalker. Of course!" An edge of disbelieving excitement crept into her voice. Anakin let it pass. She was relieved just to be a Padawan, let alone the _Chosen One's _Padawan.

Efficiently he looped her hair into a thin, tight braid. She ducked in a bow again, then watched him for some sort of signal. He really had no idea what she expected. "Uh…you can go now."

"Oh." She blushed and hurried in the direction of the dining hall. Anakin watched her go. "This…will be interesting," he muttered to himself. Well, only one really difficult part remained. He had to tell Luke.

* * *

><p>Life continued in the Jedi Temple. Kad, Luke, Leia, and Mara learned to coexist, and even began to get along.<p>

Over the years, though no one except Anakin recognized it at the time, a sort of family unit within the greater community of the Temple formed among them, concentrated around Kad. Obi-Wan became the father figure, patriarch and guardian. Master Che was the mother, disciplinarian and benevolent guide. Ferris fit in as the uncle…as much as Ferris "fit" into anything. Luke and Leia were Kad's brother and sister, reliable sources of support and play. Anakin was their much older brother, providing both the fun and games of a sibling and the guidance of an adult. Mara, the latest addition, inserted herself as a sort of step-sister, teasing but protective. They gave Kad a firm foundation for a life that had already once been shaken to pieces.

* * *

><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	5. Chapter 5 All Out

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 5: All Out<p>

The upcoming Apprentice Tournament had all the younger Padawans and Initiates excited. In the weeks leading up to it, they sparred and drilled and practiced hand-to-hand with all the anticipation such an event required. Their enthusiasm was infectious, and soon the whole Temple was in good spirits.

"Such levity," Obi-Wan commented to Anakin as they watched Luke, Leia, and Kad engage in a warm-up round while Mara stretched nearby. Their fast, flitting exercise appeared to consist of tag with the tip of a training saber. "I think they learned it from you."

Anakin shrugged innocently. "I'm sure I had nothing to do with it. They were born corrupted." He flashed his best friend a sneaky grin. "Race you down!"

"Hey, wait-" Obi-Wan protested as Anakin vaulted over the balcony rail and shot toward the floor at a Force-enhanced velocity that Master Che would not have recommended. He turned his tumbling landing into a roll and sprang to his feet in the midst of the kids' play.

"Hey!" Kad yelped, snapping his crystal green blade back from Anakin's face. "Ani!"

"Shouldn't you be practicing?" Anakin chided, mock stern. He crossed his arms, well aware that he could look intimidating with his height and dark robes, and also well aware that they weren't buying it.

Leia stepped forward with her azure lightsaber in the Djem So ready stance. "Shouldn't you get out of our way?" Her grin was both a challenge and an invitation.

Anakin was about to indulge in a lighthearted flurry of practice matches when a hooking kick collided with his feet, knocking them out from under him. He plummeted to the white mat, immobilized by a weight that pinned his legs and chest. Pinpoint stars burst in front of his eyes.

Through them he saw Obi-Wan's mischievous smile and twinkling blue eyes. "_That's _for cheating."

Anakin pushed at Obi-Wan's shoulder with one hand. "Geoff."

Obi-Wan obliged and graciously helped Anakin to his feet. "You wanted me to engage more," he explained with a shrug. "I'm engaging." Anakin rubbed his sore back. "What are a few bruises between friends? _Ow. _Leia, I'll pass, okay?"

She made a face. "Thanks a lot, Obi. I was going to kick Ani's butt." "I don't think you could," Mara said, appearing loyally at Anakin's side. Or maybe, from the defiant set to her shoulders, she was being antagonistic for the heck of it.

He nodded anyway. Her motives didn't matter. It was all fun and games today. "Good. You two can fight it out. Defend my honor, Mara."

"Eh," Mara said noncommittally. She pointed at Kad. "I'd rather fight him."

"Me?" Kad asked, as if surprised that she would bother.

"Yeah, you."

Leia shoved Kad forward. "Go on. You need practice so you can grind Kyp Durron into the dust."

Mara scowled. "Is that jerk still giving you trouble?"

Luke nodded, stepping closer to stand between Leia and Kad. "He keeps saying he'll 'show you what it means to be a real swordsman.'" His imitation of Kyp's swaggering bravado was right on.

Mara laughed appreciatively. "Not bad." She looked at Kad. "I could talk to him if you want."

Kad shifted uncomfortably between Leia and Mara's expectant stares. "I really don't want to rile Kyp up. You know he's all mouth. Anyway, the tournament starts in fifteen minutes. Shouldn't we get to the dojo?"

"Yeah, probably," Mara said, making a face. She tapped him on one slim shoulder. "If you do what you did last time you and I sparred, you'll be fine. You know, the way you fight reminds me of the Mandalorians Master Skywalker and I ran into a few missions ago. Sort of quick and wild."

The four apprentices chatted excitedly on the way to the gym selected for the competition. Anakin and Obi-Wan followed along behind.

"You didn't mention Mandalorians," Obi-Wan prompted curiously.

Anakin shrugged, strangely uncomfortable with the subject. "They were the usual. Mercenaries hired to protect the access codes we needed to get. They weren't that hard to beat. But…I realized I don't like fighting Mandalorians anymore, Master." He looked ahead at Kad. "It just occurred to me, while I was fighting one-a human woman, she felt like. What if this is Kad's mother, his sister, his aunt? I hate the idea of hurting someone he once loved."

Obi-Wan nodded slowly. "I haven't thought about that in years." Anakin shook his head. "I hadn't either. That he's Mandalorian." "Was," Obi-Wan corrected with a trace of sadness. "He wasn't raised in the culture. In their eyes, he's just as much an outsider now as you or I. _Aruetii_: foreigner, outsider, traitor. All those meanings from the same word, but it narrows down to _not one of us_."

Anakin clenched his jaw. "Well, then. Their loss."

"Yes," Obi-Wan repeated pensively. "Their loss."

They took their places with other Masters and Knights in the stands that had been erected for this occasion. Master Che waved them over to where she had saved them seats. Anakin started to settle on the bench and nearly sat on Ferris.

"I am here, you know," the spiritually amorphous Firrerreo said, amber eyes utterly aggrieved.

He patted Ferris soothingly on the shoulder. "I know. Sorry. You know how I can be. 'Unobservant.'"

Ferris fixed him with a cool, matter-of-fact stare. "Yes."

A chill ran down Anakin's spine. When Ferris spoke in that tone, it felt as if the Force itself had just confirmed his self-assessment. "Okay then." He quickly turned his attention to the assigning of pairs.

The tournament followed the sudden death format most of the students favored. A combatant was out when they either surrendered or were burned three times by the nasty training sabers. Contestants ranged in age from ten to fourteen, the majority being the Triumvirate's age.

Luke, Leia, Mara, and Kad all had decent competition for the first round. Leia and Kad beat their competition handily due to superior skill. Leia actively pursued Himesh Marus around the mat, relentless and uncompromising, until she had scored three hits against him, which took all of two minutes. Kad relied on his usual system of feints and slashes to outmaneuver his Gungan partner, Roo-Roo Page, though his friends noted that he was far from going All Out. Luke managed to outlast his Selkath adversary's heavy-handed reliance on brute strength through an avoidance of direct combat that tired the other out. He finished the weary and frustrated Selkath off with a series of quick cuts not unlike a lightsaber version of Push-Feather. Mara lost to human Kyp Durron despite her generally better honed dueling skills. Anakin privately suspected that she threw the match so Kad would have an opportunity to fight Kyp in a later round. With a careless shrug she joined the Masters in the stands to cheer on the remaining competitors.

"They're doing well," Obi-Wan remarked with convincing neutrality, though he tugged at his beard as he watched the second round and muttered when Luke lost. "He should have been more assertive and pressed the advantage. Finesse doesn't win _every _day, Luke…."

Mara leaned sideways and muttered into Anakin's ear, "Leia or Kad's gonna win."

Anakin resisted the urge to nod emphatically. His kids were all great duelists, but even the best warriors in the galaxy lost sometimes, and he wanted to be sure they were prepared for that eventuality. "I don't know," he allowed. "Some of the others are really fierce fighters."

"Oh, they're good, but not that good." Mara nodded toward her two friends. "I hope it comes down to one of them and Kyp in the final round. _That_ would teach him to brag."

* * *

><p>Kad ate lunch in a state of jittery excitement, well aware that he was one of the final two competitors, and painfully aware that the other was Kyp Durron. His friends all radiated eagerness to watch the fight, and Mara exuded smug triumph already.<p>

He had just begun his spicy avocadoes, much to his delight, when Master Ilena "Iron Hand" Xan, who organized and supervised these tournaments, stood and raised her hand in the air for attention. Silence fell in the dining hall as rapidly as it would have if it was put on mute. She looked from where Kad sat with his friends to Kyp, several tables away. "This morning's duels were, as usual, both educational and inspiring. Combatants fought fairly and determinedly, and we are all proud of you." Her gaze took in the thirty-two contestants. "Some favored drive, some ingenuity, still others raw skill. We will now observe the results of this weeding out, which will pit one who utilizes strategic restraint against one who prefers direct and brutal action. It comes down to this." She held up the red handkerchief that signaled the beginning of matches.

"Not again!" an indignant Knight exclaimed as the diners scattered to regroup against the walls, many taking their plates with them. Others shrugged resignedly and relocated to watch from under the cover of the long tables.

Master Iron Hand's dry gaze swept Kad and Kyp and had them both on their feet and grabbing for their lightsabers. "Two of you remain. May the Force be with you." She dropped the handkerchief.

Kad clenched his hands around his weapon and dropped automatically into the Shien ready stance, lightsaber in a high guard position angled behind his head. He found that now that the match was about to begin, an icy calm spread through his body. Kyp sank into the Djem So stance.

Kad's mind flew into a mental analysis of the enemy's strengths and weaknesses versus his own. Kyp had the advantage in size and strength. Though not much taller or broader, his frame was sturdier than Kad's athletic but small-boned physique. Kad's more delicate stature put him down as most likely faster, which would play to his Shien-honed strengths.

He had never fought Kyp before. The boy had several months on him and was almost thirteen. Like Mara, he had arrived at the Temple late, at almost four, and had been in Boma Clan with her. Kad recalled Mara's description of his fighting style. _"He relies on his aggressiveness more than anything else. Favors chopping moves from the periphery. He'll rain them down on your head, your sides, and basically just beat you down."_

The handkerchief landed. Kyp lunged across the room toward him, muscling tables aside with the Force. Kad sprang to block the heavy blow already descending toward his head. Lightsabers sizzled as the resulting clash jarred his arms. Punishing chops, indeed. He danced away. Jaw set in a snarl, Kyp pursued him.

For the next few minutes, Kad fought hit-and-miss, his probing tactics driving Kyp into greater straits of frustration. At last one of Kyp's jolting blows hit his arm. The shriek of his abused nerves made a yowl rise in his throat.

Kyp bared his teeth an angry satisfaction. "That's how you spar, Skir'ta," he grated out. "None of that fancy evasion."

Kad angled his blade up into an offensive position. Its stunningly beautiful green light cast Kyp's hawkish face into a foreign and predatory profile. _Right_, he thought grimly. _Time to stop playing._

Something deep inside him blazed to life. The world buckled into stark planes of primal vibrancy, a microcosm of survival: this-or-that, life-or-death, Me-or-them. Necessity opened His awareness to weaknesses and shatterpoints in the Other's defense. The Other saw the shift in His eyes and felt it in the Force. Uncertainty colored its presence, then He was upon it. Relentlessly He drove the enemy back with viper-quick strikes and agile, lupine weaving. Despite its initial alarm, the Other responded well by marshalling its forces and attempting to counterattack when He came near, but its signature fighting style was useless here. He simply did not stay in one place long enough for its battering attack to have any effect. There was no way it could win.

He ended the fight with a swift strike to the shin that unbalanced the Other just enough for His head butt to the sternum to knock it soundly to the floor. The tip of His lightsaber flashed to a rest just over the its wildly beating heart. The Other gaped up at Him. "I yield," it gasped, and tapped out.

The world shuddered and snapped back into its normal semblance. The primal edge of All Out went out like a fire suddenly doused with cold water. Kad blinked, momentarily dizzy, as his perceptions realigned themselves. The being who lay spread-eagled on the floor before him was not the Other, unnamable and dangerous, but Kyp Durron, a boy he had known for years. Not a threat to be overcome, but an opponent worthy of empathy.

Kad offered a hand to the other boy, who blinked uncomprehendingly at it, then slowly reached to take it. Kad pulled him to his feet. "Good sparring," he said earnestly.

Kyp nodded slowly. "That was…amazing. I've never seen anyone do that before. You just saw victory and went for it."

Kad felt a shy smile on his face. "It's just me, I guess. That parry you did when I was going for your back, now that's something. I didn't know that was physically possible for a human."

Kyp grinned and stretched his arms in the air, wincing. "I nearly snapped my spine doing it."

The conversation was surprisingly friendly, and it was summarily interrupted by Leia and Mara bursting out from under their table hideout and descending on Kad with Luke in hot pursuit.

"That was great," Mara crowed later as they scampered down the hall with the Masters a few paces behind. "You showed that braggart, all right. Did you see the look on his face when you went All Out?" Her eyes widened in imitation until they bulged painfully in her head. "See if he ever bothers you again! But if he does, I'll just have a word with him. Just let me know."

"-and you did this," Luke continued his blow-by-blow commentary on the match as he parried with an invisible lightsaber. Kad could barely reconcile the audacious moves Luke acted out with his own avowed reluctance to rile Kyp up. "He came in with a powerful blow from the side, his whole strength behind it-"

Leia obligingly performed the part of Kyp in their parody of the fight. Her eyes gleamed victoriously. "That'll teach _him_ what it means to be a real swordsman. Highhanded brute."

Kad was already shaking his head. "That's not fair. Kyp's just offense-oriented. He has a lot of raw power and nobody's been able to teach him to regulate it yet." He remembered the fight, his own Padawan braid streaming behind him as he leapt over a table, Kyp's shoulder bare. "He's scared he won't become a Padawan before he's thirteen. Offense is what he does best, so he's trying to attract a Master's attention and overcompensating for his poor defense. That's it. He's not bad. He just needs a Master to help him."

Obi-Wan gave him an appraising smile that made him feel a few inches taller. "Very perceptive."

Mara rolled her eyes expressively. "What's with you, really? You win against this braggart who's had it in for you for weeks, you fight like a Krayt dragon against him, and then you decide you _like_ him? I don't understand you."

Kad shrugged. He fought All Out, knife-edged in the Force, and then he sought to harmonize the tensions that had caused the fight. It was just who he was.

Master Che laid a hand on his shoulder. "That was a wonderful duel. Both during and after," she said warmly, a pleased smile creasing her blue cheeks. "I'm proud of you, Kad."

Kad smiled and looked at the ground. "It was just what you taught me, Master."

She snorted. "Don't use that fallback response on me. We all know that _I_ never taught you that."

Kad darted in to give her a quick hug. "Doesn't matter," he said into her tunic, then tried to back away, but her arm was already around his shoulders.

"That's my Padawan," she said into his hair.

The last icy dregs of the fight melted in his veins. He pressed his face into her tunic. He felt overwhelmed by gratitude, and tentative pride, and a strange, sudden desire to sob.

* * *

><p>That night, lying under his sheets with the shading on his bedroom window shut off so he could see Coruscant in all its dark-time glory, he delved into his own surreal memories of the fight. Carefully he turned them over in a meticulous inspection born of unknown fears. That wild, primal edge that made him fight like a viper-even then held in check. In hindsight, he could feel the cordons of Jedi restraint that blunted that manic howl that rose in his mind at those times to a focused hiss. That kept the fire that flared to life from being a snap of the mind. Where had that wildness come from? He compared his sparring style to those of others he had seen and decided he had learned the technique of measured release from Ani, and put his own spin on it. His special courses in Vaapad with Master Windu also had a hand in it, doubtless. He held himself in a balance when he went All Out that was not yet serenity, but very well could be one day-maybe.<p>

He lay on his side and stared out at the warm glow of Coruscant. In here it was a Jedi's world. The thought dawned slowly, a cautious and troubling late night musing. What would someone with that razor edge who had not been reared in the Temple's ways of rigorous self-discipline be like? A howl of untamed fury flitted at the edges of his mind, an imagined sound so strong he could have sworn he'd heard it before. Someone like that, he thought with a shudder, would be a devil.

* * *

><p><strong>Is anyone at all reading this? If so, please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	6. Chapter 6 The Scourge

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 6: The Scourge<p>

When the philosophers of Chalacta say there is no time but the present, they neglect to mention the Force. The Force binds all times together. For a Jedi, echoes of other times and places whisper through dreams and visions. The wounds and joys of yesterday are not a long ago question, but an omnipresent facet of life. Yet, even as the past is more tangible for a Jedi, it is, perhaps cruelly, just as unreachable. Its vistas, whether ablaze with the blissful halo of memory or ragged and bleak with remembered pain, are just beyond reach. Even Force-induced time travel, the disorienting Flow Walking, cannot alter the past, for whatever is accomplished during these walks already happened long ago. The future is another matter. Always in motion, the future is quite honestly theirs to make. But the past is unalterable. Unalterable, and inescapable.

The Force is a current. It ebbs and flows in patterns. Some things will always return.

* * *

><p>The day of the urban exercise dawned bright and clean, the air pleasantly warm with the approach of summer. Kad, Luke, and Leia reported to the Temple's front hall with the thirty-odd other Initiates and Padawans who would be taking part. Mara had been disinclined to sign up because she felt it was mainly an activity for "kids," despite the fact that many of her peers joined in because of the specific request for more participants. The apprentices were assigned to groups of seven. There were six of these groups.<p>

"Conquer three different stalls in three different markets to win, you must," Yoda told the apprentices gravely as they studied the territory lit up on their datapads. "Test your ingenuity, this will, hmmm?"

"Master," Brisha Ca'dras, captain of the green team, asked, "do the stall owners know about this?"

Yoda smiled mysteriously. "Find out, you will."

"How can one team of seven conquer three fruit stands?" another student wondered aloud, scratching his gills in confusion.

"Be creative, you must!" Yoda declared with an emphatic jab of his stick in the sheepishly grinning boy's direction. "A state of anarchy, you are in! Make up your own rules, you will."

"Of course the ordinary rules must still be followed," Mace Windu, who had come to help see the mob off, cut in quickly. "Stay in the area outlined on you pads. One light tap with a lightsaber on _low_ means you're out. If you are out, don't interfere with the exercise. Every member of each group must be at one of the three stalls by sundown. Furthermore-" He punctuated his statement with a stern glare that quelled everyone but Leia. "-there will be no intentional involvement of bystanders, and no taking citizens hostage."

"We know the rules," Leia muttered impatiently. "Let's _go!_"

She and the boys were assigned to the gray team. They and their four team members were flown by a Knight to their starting point. They crouched in the back of the speeder, torn between seriousness and excitement.

"All right," their appointed leader said tartly. "We need a plan. Any suggestions?"

"Divide and conquer," Leia suggested instantly. "We need to split into two groups and take a stall from different angles."

Kad thought of the seeming impossibility of the exercise ahead. His seven member team take three stalls and hold off five other seven member teams? Not likely. Unless….

Luke's face lit up as he thought of the solution at the same time Kad did. "Alliance!" they exclaimed in unison, and grinned at one another. "Come again?" their avian leader asked.

"Once we've secured one stall, we form a lasting alliance with another team," Luke explained, eagerly pulling up the rosters on his datapad. "Red team would be good, Skitch. Kyp's still feeling friendly toward us, so if we asked nicely-"

Skitch shook her head with a frown. "But isn't that against the-" She trailed off. "'Be creative.' 'A state of anarchy.' Terrific."

Leia swept her hand toward the cityscape of Coruscant. "This is about to be a battleground of Jedi guerilla warfare." She grinned widely back at her friends. Kad could swear she looked just like Ani when she did that. "Ready?"

Skitch sighed and belted her datapad. "Fine, you get your way. Divide and conquer. I'll take Kad and-"

"Kad is mine," Leia stated so brazenly that she brokered no argument. "So we're going after the Little Sullusta stall first," Skitch summarized minutes later as they drew up to their starting point. "The Triumvirate will go through the alleys, and the rest of us will take the standard walkways. We ambush the stall, capture it, and try to make contact with red team. If we successfully ally ourselves with them, we make more plans then. If not, we try to pick them all off and move on to gold team. Any questions?"

Since there were none, the Triumvirate peeled off from the main group and headed in another direction. Kad's veins buzzed with adrenaline. He couldn't keep from grinning almost giddily at his friends, who beamed back. They virtually scampered through the alleys, silent but delighted with themselves for no reason.

Gradually, though, as Leia led the way farther into the tangle of alleyways, Kad wondered if they hadn't strayed too far. He looked up at the apartment blocks that stretched above them. The ones near the Little Sullusta market weren't spotless, certainly, but these were downright dingy, stained with grime and marked with ranks of windows like silent, accusing eyes. "Leia, I think this is the wrong way."

She pulled up short and pointed to a cagelike lift that hulked at the end of the alley. "That's it."

Luke stopped in his tracks. "_No_."

Leia turned to him abruptly. "You got a better idea?"

Luke shook his head mutely. Kad wasn't even sure if it was an admission or another refusal.

Leia pulled out her datapad and held it where the boys could see. She traced her finger across the triangular sector of the exercise. "See, the stall is here. We're here, and Skitch and the others are following this route _here_." She jabbed the screen for emphasis. "If we take this lift here, we can sneak through the lower levels and surprise any other teams by coming out this ramp just a few meters away from the stall. No one will expect it."

Luke looked pained already. "But if we leave the perimeter set for the exercise, we're disqualified."

Leia put a companionable arm around his shoulders. "Look. We'll be going beneath. Technically we're not going outside the perimeter."

Luke sighed. His shoulders sagged slightly. "Obi's going to kill me." Kad flinched inwardly as he pictured his own Master's irate expression if she learned he had gone to the Lower Levels without at least a Knight accompanying him. Then he thought of Anakin, practically boiling over with righteous fury that they would put themselves at risk, and Obi-Wan's disappointed frown.

Leia tweaked him lightly through the Force. "They'll never know. C'mon. Let's go. Live a little."

The three Padawans stepped into the lift. Luke reluctantly worked the greasy controls. "Obi got it wrong. There is no way I'm related to someone as crazy as you. You are not my sister."

"I am," Leia said confidently. "I'm our better half."

The ride seemed interminably long. When the door squeaked open, they slipped out. Dimly lit alleys like caves stretched in either direction into the gloom.

A passing Wookiee stopped when it saw them and growled menacingly. Leia raised her chin and pulled her lightsaber from her belt. She ignited it. Blade angled neutrally, she held it toward the Wookiee. "Your choice," she said with a jerk of her head at Kad and Luke as their blades blazed into being. The Wookiee grunted and backed away. They stayed by the open lift door until it disappeared down a side alley.

Leia turned to look at them. "No problem. No one wants to be on the receiving end of a lightsaber."

Kad extinguished his but did not return it to his belt. "Let's just get on with it."

"Right," Leia said briskly. They broke into a quick trot toward the lift that would take them up to Sullusta Market.

The Lower Levels apparently had two distinct types of locations: places where there were many unsavory characters, and places where there were fewer unsavory characters. They saw a few of the first kind around corners or at the far end of an alley, and Kad knew they were bars. Harsh light and jarring music poured from their open doorways. They were in too much of a hurry to glance into one, but he was sure he would see rowdy beings downing frothy glasses of alcohol, willowy dancers undulating suggestively on raised platforms, possibly a fistfight or a mugging.

The Triumvirate's route kept them away from the more crowded thoroughfares of Coruscant's underbelly. Instead they skirted the edges of a labyrinth of twisted alleyways full of rusting dumpsters and the eerie skittering of rats. The dank air oozed a sense of constant danger into their lungs. All three fell into the intent focus they lived in while on serious missions. Luke, the one with the subtlest Force touch, cast ahead of and around them for danger. Leia kept track of their location.

Kad assigned himself the task of rear guard. Twice he scared away pickpockets aiming to swipe a lightsaber by pointing the unignited hilt at their throats.

"Cheeky one, ain't it?" guffawed one of a pair of seriously drunk Weequay leaning in a doorway as a repelled Devaronian thief lisped apologies and hurried away.

"Lucky hoo," the second chortled, a wet sound ending in a snort as he inhaled his shot of liqueur.

The first prattled on, oblivious to his friend's distress. "Yep, gonna do fine down here, youngin'," he leered at Kad. "Jus' don' hesitate to ram that laser sword through 'is gut next time."

Kad took a careful step away from the intoxicated Weequay toward Luke and Leia, who watched from several meters ahead. Luke touched him through the Force with a plea for caution.

The Weequay who had nearly drowned in his own whiskey passed out cold on the steps. The other lurched to his feet and shambled in Kad's direction. "Jedi, am I right? Get lost, or run away?"

"Stay back," Kad warned in the deceptively mild tone Obi-Wan used when he was at his most dangerous.

The Weequay laughed, a horrible choking sound. He stumbled closer. His drunken movements reminded Kad of those of a reanimated corpse. "Oh, big man. Thinkin' a movin' down here with us humble worms?" He paused to down a swig of poison-amber colored liquid from a canteen. "Gonna live in the Tangle, li'l Jedi?" He pointed a swaying finger at the dark alley mouth Luke and Leia stood in. "Think ya can han'le that? Wha' 'bout the Scourge?"

Kad backed up a step. "I have no quarrel with you," he warned.

"The Scourge of the Lower Levels!" the Weequay raved. "It'll kill you quick from behind, li'l Jedi, whether you know it or not! It haunts the Tangle and brings down ones lots bigger 'n you. Yur lost, yur gonna die. Let me help!" He grabbed spasmodically at the Padawan's shoulder. Kad hurled him against the wall with the Force and fled down the alley. "It haunts the Tangle, and it'll get you, Jedi! It'll get you!" the mad Weequay howled after them.

"I'm sorry!" Leia panted as they skidded around a corner. "You were right. This was a bad idea."

"You think?" Luke gasped.

They paused at another corner to examine Leia's map. "We're close," she said. "See?"

Luke leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes. "Good, because if we ever-" He stopped. "I've got a bad feeling."

The other two quieted and waded more deeply into the Force. A thrum of discord shivered down their spines. An instant later, shouts resounded at the end of an alley. A second after that, the first blaster shots rang out. Kad dropped to the ground while Luke ducked around the corner and Leia pressed herself against the wall.

Jittering repeating shots cracked louder as a frenzy of violence swept toward them. A Trandoshan with a black sunburst tattooed across his face sprinted down the corridor. He fired over his shoulder with an automatic Verpine as he ran. The metal shots peppered the walls. Three outraged Bothans dressed in flame-hued body suits gave chase with blasters shooting. A Verpine slug rebounded off the wall just inches from Leia.

"Run," she hissed.

More shouts rose from the open plaza down the corridor. An ominous crackling roar followed by agonized howls and spearing pain in the Force informed them of the gravity of the situation.

"Flame throwers," Leia muttered through clenched teeth. "Run. Now!"

As one they broke from their hiding places and darted into the maze of alleyways the drunk Weequay had called the Tangle. The Bothans' rage flared hotter at their escape attempt. Feet pounded the duracrete in pursuit. _Gang warfare_, they concluded. _And we're about to get caught up in it. _

Luke sent a suggestion of Force-sprint. In the blink of an eye they were almost invisible as they streaked through the underworld of Coruscant. Away, away, away from the roiling violence that seeped danger into the Force. Only once the distant shadows no longer glowed wavering orange did they stop.

Kad dropped to his knees and laughed a little giddily. "I think we're going to be late for the rendezvous, Leia."

Leia's thick braid wound round her head had come undone. Her hair straggled wildly around her shoulders. She grinned lopsidedly. "Oops. I guess I learned the art of shortcuts from Ani a bit too well."

Luke, ever the pragmatist, gazed up at the towering walls. "Any idea where we are?"

The alleys twisted in wickedly deceptive ways deep in the Tangle. Narrow walls closed in on them to the point of claustrophobia. The buildings seemed to be derelict tenements. Only dumpsters full of rotting things and scurrying rats dwelled there, from what Kad could sense.

He tilted his head back. Above were only eternal walls and blackness. _I wonder if this is where I lived before the Jedi found me_, he thought. Nothing here was familiar, for which he was very grateful. This pit was a different world entirely from the illuminated cityscape of the grand galactic capital.

He pushed himself to his feet. "Let's get out of-" He fell silent just as the twins froze.

Thumps and scrapes sounded from the gloom of a narrow alley just a few meters away from them. Something was running toward them, breathing heavily. They jumped to their feet. Twin orbs of gold reflected the green of Kad's ignited lightsaber seconds before a shot of yellow streaked right at them.

Luke sprang straight up. Leia dove into a roll that carried her out of the way.

Kad jabbed his lightsaber in the thing's direction, ready to ram it up the creature's nose if need be, but it stopped short. A hideous, jowly face gazed up at him. Its congested breathing was preternaturally loud to his adrenaline-charged and Force-enhanced hearing. The animal-whatever it was-whined and edged away from the lightsaber, seeking a safe path around it. Kad slowly lowered his weapon as its emotions swamped him. Complete love and adoration: aimed squarely at him.

He blinked, dumbfounded, at the peerless devotion that poured off it in waves. It whimpered imploringly, longingly, and tried to duck under his blade to reach him. He extinguished his weapon, and the ugly golden animal crowded joyfully against his legs, grumbling in ecstasy.

"Kad," Luke asked tremulously. He looked up at his friend, affixed eight meters off the ground to the looming walls. "W-what did you do?"

He looked slowly back at the animal. It leaned its whole weight against his knees and gazed up at him with love so strong he felt a little overwhelmed. "I didn't," was all he could manage.

Leia edged closer. The creature whipped its head around and snarled. She sprang into a defensive stance. "Get away from Kad," she said tightly, "or I'll-"

The animal turned and assumed a fighting posture. Its hackles raised as it growled a challenge.

"Hey!" Kad exclaimed, feeling that the situation was really getting out of hand. Both the offenders looked at him. The creature's love was touching, but it was also a little creepy, given the circumstances. In a fight, it would be him and Leia against it, and he really didn't want it to come to that. "You." He pointed at the animal. It whined unhappily. "She's my friend." He backed toward Leia. "And so is he." His finger drew its puzzled attention up to Luke, still on the wall. "If…if you love me so much, you can't hurt them. Ever."

It cocked his head at him. Bright tendrils of thought danced through its woven being in the Force. If not a sentient, it was close. A placating whine squeaked from its throat as it waddled forward and nose Leia's palm. She stiffened and held up her hand, now dripping with drool. "Ew."

"Guys," Luke called a trifle shakily from above. "I think we found the Scourge of the Lower Levels."

Kad felt suddenly dizzy. This…_thing_ was a sentient-eater. He activated his lightsaber again and held it up to get a better view of the thing. Short gold fur covered what looked like many decameters of loose skin. It had six legs and rather large teeth that-he nearly dropped his lightsaber when he saw it-were stained with blood of several different colors, but human red was the topmost layer.

Leia peered behind it discreetly. "I think it's really an it," she said in surprise. The Scourge grumbled reprovingly at her. She shrugged, unapologetic. "I was curious."

"I'm getting distinctly feminine vibes," Luke remarked as he shinnied down the wall.

"I _looked_," Leia insisted. She waved a hand at it, which the Scourge sniffed and then drooled on. "Yuck. It's an it. A hermaphrodite."

"Are you sure?"

"Didn't Ferris ever tell you that's a stupid question?"

The Scourge ended the argument by shouldering its way between them back into the alley from which it had emerged.

"Do you think it's leaving?" Kad whispered, torn between abject relief that it was wandering away and numbing confusion.

Luke shook his head, eyes closed as he honed in on the alley. "No, it's- There's something- Oh no!" he groaned, just as the Scourge returned. A fuzzy golden mini-Scourge dangled from its jaws, backmost feet dragging on the ground. The Scourge deposited its load at Kad's feet and looked up at him with an encouraging whine. Kad stared down at his reflection mirrored in the yellow entirety of the baby's eyes, at a loss. It whined at a higher pitch and wiggled, distinctly nervous.

Leia crouched down and reached a tentative hand toward the baby. It cringed and whimpered, then cautiously raised its head to meet her palm. She stroked its downy scalp. "This is the exact opposite of a Verpine slug," she stated flatly, as if dazed by the contrast. Luke giggled into his sleeve, sounding a little overwhelmed. Kad felt the same way. He just didn't feel like laughing about it.

The Scourge cuddled against his legs again and raised its jowls toward him, begging to be petted. Maternal bliss haloed it like an aurora. Helplessly Kad rubbed its jaw and chest. The fur was bristled but soft, as well as unspeakably greasy. Oil and mildew came off on his palms in obscenely filthy smudges.

"Do you think these things…impress?" Luke asked suddenly, shooting the baby a wary glance. It whined questioningly. He edged away.

"I guess," Kad answered. "Why else would it love me so much?"

None of them was ever sure how long they crouched in that alley, fondling the Scourge and its offspring, which Leia dubbed Verp. The Scourge was in a state of supreme rapture. It lounged on its back, feet extended languorously in the air, in such a position of expectation that they would have been remiss not to massage and caress. Time might as well have stopped. Well, Kad reflected bemusedly as he petted the indolent animal's stinking stomach, Jedi were meant to serve, and they were obviously performing a great service by being here. Surely Master Che would understand….

With a stir of unease, he consulted his innate sense of the passage of time. Alarm bordering on horror coursed down his Force-bond with the twins as all three realized that it was well past noon.

"Oh no!" Luke groaned. "We're going to get it." They sprang up from the supine Scourge and raced back the way they had come.

The drunk Weequay were awake and aware enough to play Sabacc over a pile of death sticks. Their level of alertness was medically amazing, really, considering their physiological makeup, relatively lean bodies, and the amount of hard alcohol they had consumed. The one who had ranted at Kad looked up through bloodshot eyes, the beginnings of a leering grin on his face-which froze and twisted into a gape of terror as ghastly screeches erupted from him and his companion. "_The Scourge!_" The Weequay leapt to their feet. Shoving one another aside in their eagerness to get away, they tripped down the alley at an inebriated run.

Kad spun to see the Scourge a few feet behind him. Verp clung to its back between the shoulder blades. The Scourge looked up at him loyally. "No, no, _no_!" he exclaimed in dismay. "You can't just follow me home!" The Scourge jerked its head back in surprise. "We're going to be in enough trouble without having to explain them," Kad said to Luke and Leia. The Scourge's whimper was infused with pain and loss Kad felt much too strong for the occasion. Still, if it had indeed impressed upon him…. What could they do? Apologetically he raised helpless hands to Luke and Leia. "We can't just leave them."

Annoyance prickled off Leia's Force presence. "You sure changed your tune quickly enough," she snapped as they headed more slowly toward the nearest ramp to the Upper Levels. The Scourge dogged their heels. Kad flushed unhappily. This whole mess was about to get worse.

They scaled the ramp and emerged into the glancing sun of late afternoon. The light dazzled them after so long in the dark. Kad lifted his head toward the sky in relief. The Scourge thrust itself between him and Luke and gazed up at the sky as well. Wistfulness tinged its primal blaze of feeling. Verp squeaked in apparent pain and buried its nose in its mother's folds. Speeders streamed by in the multi-leveled skylanes. What a different world this was. The Temple's soaring spires drew Kad's eyes inexorably home.

They began to make their way to the Little Sullusta market along the conventional route. The panic the Scourge's presence had elicited in the Tangle district of the Lower Levels petered out to wariness on the peaceful walkways of the Upper Levels. Some pedestrians gave it a wide berth. Others failed to notice it at all and trundled or slithered or hopped on by. The Scourge stared around brightly, nose raised to the air. Verp had not emerged from its mother's folds yet, and seemed unlikely to, from the way the skin over its head was trembling.

Completely without warning, a hand seized Kad by the shoulder and spun him roughly around. He yelped, going automatically for his lightsaber, but a black gloved hand caught his wrist. Anakin, furious with worry, glared down at him. "Kad Skir'ta," he grated. "Luke and Leia Amidala. Where. Have. You. Been."

Kad and Luke froze, instantly guilty. Leia raised her chin in defiance. "We're going home."

"Oh?" Anakin asked, all false cheeriness. "That's all right then. Besides the fact that they called off the exercise when you all didn't show up and that over a dozen Jedi are scouring the streets for you as we speak, including Obi-Wan, Ferris, and Vokara. But hey, if you're going home everything's forgiven. You're in so much- _Yaaah!_" He sprang backward when the Scourge stuck its snuffling nose between Leia's legs to investigate the source of the clamor. The Triumvirate burst out laughing at his comical overreaction.

The Scourge grumbled inquiringly and looked to Kad for direction. Gradually Anakin edged closer. "Is that a strill?" he asked incredulously. The Scourge took his measure warily.

"He's a friend," Kad said quickly. It rumbled in fellowship and stretched its head forward to sniff Anakin's glove.

The older Jedi appeared torn between a desire to backpedal quickly and the urge to stroke its folds. "Luke, Leia, Kad, what-"

"It found us," Kad said helplessly. "It's in love with me, and they won't leave."

"They?" Anakin asked just as Verp announced itself by squeaking loudly in a pitch that seemed to imply hunger of the highest degree. Anakin's eyes widened noticeably. "And here I thought we wouldn't have to worry about you bringing strays home," he muttered under his breath. "Come on. Let's get back. Everyone will be wondering, and we certainly don't want to leave the others out of a good story, do we?" He entered a number on his wrist com. "Skywalker here. I've found them."

"Good." They went rigid at the baritone of Jedi Master Mace Windu, unmistakably irked. "Bring them back. Are they injured?"

"No, but there are…complications."

"What sort of complications?"

All four of them cast the Scourge and Verp a look. "Two very ugly and smelly complications."

* * *

><p>Kad wanted to crawl into a hole and never come out when Master Windu advanced on him and the twins in the Temple's front hall, flanked by Masters Kenobi, Che, and Olin.<p>

The Jedi Order's Master of the Council crossed his arms. "Explain." It wasn't a request. It wasn't even an order. He simply stated their next move, confident that they would comply because, after all, he had said it. His predictions in these matters were never wrong. Leia stepped forward and took the blame. Master Windu was unsurprised.

Anakin gave an outraged yelp. "You went _where_? Leia Amidala-"

Master Che said nothing. Her head snapped in Kad's direction. They locked eyes, and he saw such disbelief followed instantly by steely displeasure. His stomach plummeted.

"All right," Master Windu nodded briskly as Leia finished her explanation. "You were arrogant and overconfident. Those are well-established vices of yours, Padawan Amidala. Luke and Kad were too quick to go against their better judgment in an attempt to please a friend. That is a well-established vice of each of you, Padawans Amidala and Skir'ta. Your Masters can handle you now. I just have one more question. What are _those_?"

He pointed to the puddle of gold skin that was the Scourge. It spread itself out at Kad's feet, once again the epitome of decadence, a prolonged grumble proclaiming the Temple's cool marble floors to exceed expectations. Verp dabbed at it with a hesitant paw. Hunger and growing nerves exuded from the softly quivering baby.

"My word," Obi-Wan said. He knelt by the animals' sides. The Scourge opened one eye. He offered a hand, palm up, to be sniffed. It complied and drooled. "That's a strill, all right," he said. "They're native to Mandalore, Mace. Rather endangered, last time I heard."

Mace Windu eyed the spreading slick of drool with distaste. "And what is it doing here?"

Kad explained about their meeting. "Do they impress?" he asked Obi-Wan.

The Jedi Master shook his head. "Not to my knowledge."

"Well, they can't stay here," Master Windu put in emphatically. "This is the Jedi Temple. We do not-" The Scourge rolled onto its feet with a squeal of surprise and twisted to stare at Kad. "-keep pets," Master Windu finished. He looked at Obi-Wan. "I trust you can handle it?"

Obi-Wan picked up Verp, making sure the Scourge could see what he was doing, and held it up at eye level. It trembled. He blew gently on its face. It squeaked in surprise but returned his regard with new trust. "Don't worry," he said. "They're in good hands." Verp nosed his short reddish-brown beard curiously and purred when it discovered it to be of similar consistency to its mother's fur.

"Indeed," Master Windu said, unconvinced. "The urban exercise will be rescheduled on a later date, and you three are required to attend." His eyes bored holes into the Triumvirate before he swept away. That figured. It was typical Jedi thinking to stick them in such a situation to see how they fared the second time around. The Scourge nosed Kad's leg, piping a confused warble.

Master Che advanced to reclaim her wayward apprentice. "Well," she said dryly. "You certainly handled _that_ with surgical precision." Ouch. She laid a hand on his shoulder in a gesture of reconciliation if not forgiveness. "All right. Obi-Wan, could you explain what this…strole has to do with my Padawan?"

Obi-Wan was by now flat on his back on the marble floor while Verp prowled over him. "Hmm? Oh, strill. I really can't say. They do not impress, but they are very intelligent and very loyal."

"Intelligent enough to warrant an introduction?"

"Oh, I suppose."

Master Che smiled somewhat wryly at Kad before crouching. Her tan robe spilled around her. Regrettably its hem caught the edge of the drool slick and began to soak it in. As a healer, however, she doubled as a doctor. Blood and guts and bodily fluids bothered her not at all. "Hello. I am Master Vokara Che. Kad's…mother."

The Scourge sneezed and jerked its head in absolute denial.

"She is," Kad put in quickly. A parent-child relationship was the simplest way to explain the Master-Padawan arrangement, but the Scourge now glared at his Master in brazen accusation. Maybe they smelled too different, he thought. "My adoptive mother."

The angry disbelief began to fade from the Scourge's eyes.

"All right." Master Che nodded to herself, pleased. "These are Kad's friends, Luke and Leia Amidala and Mara Jade."

Indeed, the red-haired girl had just arrived at a full-out run. Ferris quickly intercepted her just before she stepped in the drool slick.

"Ferris Olin, Anakin Skywalker, and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Ferris is Leia's father, Obi-Wan is Luke's, and Anakin is Mara's. We are Jedi. This is our home, the Jedi Temple."

The Scourge looked around at the vaulted hall, the visible beams of light slanting from the windows that characterized the Temple's atmosphere. It leaned its massive head against Kad's knees unhappily.

"Kad, have you ever met this…Scourge before?"

"No."

"Are you sure?" Obi-Wan, now sitting cross-legged with Verp nestled contentedly in his lap, asked. "Look closely, now. It may have been a long time ago."

Did Obi think he had encountered it in the Lower Levels before he was found? Kad turned his eyes to the knee-high monstrosity beside him. He examined its myriad folds, the broad chest that gave it a tank-like presence, the skeins of drool leaking from its gaping mouth, the uniformly yellow eyes. Nothing struck a cord of memory.

"Never," he said with conviction. "I'm sure, Obi. This is the first time."

Obi-Wan nodded. "Then you must remind it of someone. Someone it loved."

"Someone loved that?" Mara demanded in obvious disbelief.

"Mara!" Anakin hissed.

She shot him a vaguely resentful glance.

"So it must have a family somewhere," Master Che concluded. "Or someone who knows it. If we can find them, that will solve our problem." Obi-Wan stood and handed Verp to Luke. "Until then, they should stay here. And I know the perfect punishment for you, younglings." He smiled mildly. "You get to bathe them. Every other day."

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><p><strong>Please review. <strong>

**mad'ika**


	7. Chapter 7 The Mind of a Child

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 7: The Mind of a Child<p>

A warm wash of water cascaded over Kad and the Scourge. He didn't even bother to protest. The strill grumbled happily as the three Padawans took up sponges and scrubbed its folds vigorously. On the stone border of a nearby vegetable patch, Mara washed the happily burbling Verp. Both animals loved the caresses they received during the bathes.

"So what now?" Leia asked, sloshing more water over the sudsy Scourge. "It's been two weeks, and we haven't heard anything."

"Honestly, I doubt you ever will," Mara put in. "Unidentified beings show up all the time. Master Skywalker and I spent over a month looking for the identity of this little Aleena girl someone found over in Jrade district -not a trace. And that's a little kid. These things are-not." She held Verp up to eyelevel. "Doesn't mean we don't love you. Just means you're indecently ugly." It wiggled and squeaked at her.

Kad looked down at the scrub brush in his hand. He wished Mara wouldn't talk about abandoned children. He was a veteran of rejection himself. From what little the Masters had said about his arrival, he had been found abandoned in Coruscant's Lower Levels as an infant. Even though he'd never known his family, it hurt to think they had felt so burdened by him that they didn't even bother to put him in an orphanage. Instead they left him in some dark room alone. He actually thought he remembered something about that. In the memory, it was black and he was scared. Then the door opened, and it was someone tall and unfamiliar, and he was even more scared. Arms reached for him, but they weren't the arms of- Blank. Who? Mother? Father? Brother or sister? He would never know.

Mara set the baby down and telekinetically dried it off. "See ya." Off she went toward the Temple proper.

Leia lifted the moisture off the Scourge and lashed it into the pea patch with a snap of the hand. "Stars! We have to do something! Obi's mentioned sending them to Mandalore to let his friends there find a home for them. That's not going to work." She looked first Luke, then Kad in the eye. "_We _need to find their home."

Kad sighed. "But how do we do that?"

They fell silent, trying to think of something the Masters had missed. Luke suddenly dropped to a crouch beside the Scourge. "Do you have a family besides Verp?"

The luxurious contentment faded from its demeanor. A sad whimper formed in its throat.

"A dad or a mom maybe? Someone who takes care of you?"

The whimper lengthened into a drawn out whine. Kad felt a pang at its obvious grief.

"Are they- Is…he…alive?" Luke asked, probing.

The Scourge brought its head up in a jerk.

Luke looked helplessly over his shoulder at Leia and Kad. "There's someone…. A man. That's all I can tell."

"So you can get thoughts from it?" Leia jumped on the idea. "Great. Scourge, did you live on Coruscant?"

The answering feeling was a tentative affirmative.

"Can you show us where?"

The Scourge jumped up, bristling at some unpleasant memory, but apparently ready to go.

"Come on," Leia urged.

"Wait," Kad said. "I need to tell Master Che at least."

"And I have to tell Obi," Luke insisted. "You may have a Master who knows every move you're going to make before even you do, Leia, but we don't."

"Fine. We're taking the Scourge for a walk."

Kad went to the Healing Halls at a brisk trot. He passed Master Caudle in the middle of preliminary healing lessons with the younglings in one of the sitting rooms off the main hall. The human healer sat on a circular meditation pad with the five-year-old younglings clustered before him, healing crystals in hand. Caudle grimaced as he held the tip of his lightsaber to the skin of his forearm and burned himself. Both his arms were mottled with scar tissue from years of preliminary training. His hands no longer worked as smoothly as they once had; they had been broken too many times. Master Caudle was the test dummy of the healing halls. He looked like he had been most thoroughly tortured.

He smiled blandly up at Kad, though. "Her office."

He bowed his thanks and rushed to the room which Master Che had made her own. The windows were thrown open. A summer breeze circulated through the room. The Twi'lek healer sat behind an austere desk of black wood looking through a medical journal.

She glanced up and smiled at him. "Kad? Come in."

Kad stopped just inside the doorway. The case of shelves to one side of the wall held the archaic books Jedi were so fond of, medical texts that were incredible in their primitive accuracy, as well as accounts and case studies written by healers past. The only decoration on the desk was an illuminator that sent diffused light of ever-changing color dancing across the far wall-across Kad's face, now. "Master, I'm going to take the Scourge for a walk with Luke and Leia."

"All right. Be back by dinner. I want us to go to one of the medcenters tonight. It's high time you learned how to stop a heart attack."

Kad nodded, almost smiling. He enjoyed outings to the medcenters, not because he liked the healing so much, but for the looks of surprise on the organic staff's faces with his Master strode in like she reigned over their medicine as well as the healing here. "I wouldn't miss it, Master."

"Good. Run along. I'll give you this article later; it's really quite fascinating. Did you know that Firrerreos who are allergic to ginger are known to emit some sort of bioluminescence from the skin when they consume it? I wonder if Ferris-"

Kad knew that Ferris was already long gone. The thought of Leia's vanishing Master caused a grin to cross his face; Ferris's way of not being there was an affectionate running joke among him and his friends. Feeling uncharacteristically playful and carefree, he escaped before his Master could launch into a delighted rant.

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><p>Master Che looked up as Kad grinned at her. The light that played across her doorway shaded from mauve to scarlet. He was just a little too short for it to touch his face, so it colored his hair instead. At that instant, smiling so irreverently, half-turned to run from the room, he looked so much like Fib that she came up short. The shocking color the clone dyed his hair, the cheeky grin, the eyes-he could have been a younger Fib, the Fib that would have been if the galaxy had any justice: a thirteen-year-old who wasn't twenty-seven, a Jedi from day one, and her gifted, flippant Padawan.<p>

Then the child whirled and ran from the room, and it was like a door closed. She watched the jet black hair, short on top and shaved on the sides, as Kad raced down the hall. To her surprise, loss welled in her throat. Might-have-been, might-have-been. What a pitiless taunt. She clenched her hand and shut off the soft spray of rainbow light with a pressure of the Force on the activation plate. The illumination went out like a life extinguished. What a cruel trick of the light.

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><p>The Scourge was on the move. It plowed through the crowds of Coruscant without regard for their sense of balance or sanitation, head lowered to the ground, eyes eerily bright. The Triumvirate paced single file behind it. Verp remained at the Temple in the company of Obi-Wan. The whole venture felt oddly like a military reconnaissance. The Scourge radiated a direct sense of purpose that made the Padawans, partly in play and partly unconsciously, fall into a regular, timed march.<p>

It led them into a less reputable section of Coruscant, then several levels down. Despite Kad's misgivings, this part of the Lower Levels wasn't so bad. It was seedy and rundown, certainly, but the indefinable air of menace the Tangle had held was mostly absent. Several times he saw a Coruscant Security Force speeder on patrol. Good. Allies in any trouble they came across.

The Scourge stopped outside a diner of the sort that only loyal regulars would frequent.

"The Kragget," Luke read off the flashing plasma sign.

Posters of the food available trimmed the edges of the expansive front window, apparently as an incentive to go inside. Kad shuddered to think of the real state of the establishment's steak if the picture on display was considered complementary.

"Is this your home?" Luke asked the Scourge, which nosed at the door. It snuffled in annoyance and a bit of distress when the door didn't automatically whisk open.

"There's an activation pad," Luke said, and tapped the required spot. The Scourge whined in disapproval and waddled right into the restaurant's interior.

"Okay," Leia said bravely. "Maybe we've found it's family."

The three Jedi stepped inside. A bell buzzed loudly.

"Just a minute," a husky female voice called from the kitchen. The patrons, scattered in twos and threes around the worn room, glanced up from their chatter and away when they realized they didn't know the newcomers. "Coming, coming," a middle-aged female Twi'lek said as she bustled out of the back, burdened by two trays heaped with steaming food.

The Scourge started forward, a happy, lost grumble of greeting forming in its throat. The Twi'lek halted in her tracks. If her hands hadn't been full, she would have raised one to her mouth in shock. "You," she whispered. She looked around wildly. Seeing none but familiar faces, her eyes landed on the only strangers in the room. She took in their earth-toned robes; recognition and an odd look of loss crossed her face. Shakily she put the trays on the tables of nearby diners. "Can I help you?"

Leia nodded to the strill. "We were wondering-"

"Come with me." The Twi'lek disappeared into the kitchen.

The Triumvirate shared uncertain looks. _Can we trust her? Should we?_ In the end, they decided to.

The Twi'lek ushered them into a refrigerated storage room, where she offered the Scourge a greasy hunk of raw meat in cupped hands that shook slightly. The Scourge bolted down the food ravenously. "Mird," she croaked disbelievingly. Puffs of vapor gathered around her nose and mouth, their waxing and waning keeping time to her shallow breaths.

"Is that its name?" Luke asked.

She looked up and blinked, as if she had forgotten they were there. "Mird the still. It always slobbered all over the floors."

The Scourge-Mird-licked her hands almost desperately, as if starved for any vestige of familiarity.

"So it's not yours?"

The Twi'lek shook her head. "Sorry. Can we start over? I'm Soronna. I'm a waitress here. You're Jedi."

"Right," Luke said, taking over as the best diplomat of the three. Soronna nodded vaguely. "I used to know one of you. Poor girl killed back in the Clone Wars. Etain Tur-Mukan. I haven't seen a Jedi here since she died on Kashyyk. Oh, Mird, what happened?"

"I'm sorry for your loss," Luke said, looking just bothered enough to keep the words from sounding hollow. Kad sensed he wasn't just being polite. He knew the feeling, hearing of the deaths of the Clone Wars: any one of them could have been Obi, Ani, Ferris, or even them, if they had been born a generation earlier.

"I suppose the- Mird isn't yours?"

She shook her head, blinded to anything now but Mird's ugly, sorrowful face. "It belonged to a renter we had awhile back. Vau, his name was. I don't remembered the first name. Wello, Valin, something like that. He never was one for familiarity. Years ago he just…disappeared. Him and the rest of them. The apartment was ransacked, blaster burns on the walls and a huge hole in the ceiling."

Piercing suspicion made the Triumvirate exchange a glance. They really had no reason to guess what they did. It could have been an old grudge, it could have been gang rivalry, it could have been any number of things…but the specter hung over the galaxy still, especially over those who had been closest to the being that cast such an insidious shadow.

"How long ago?" Luke asked.

"Ten, twelve years. Just days before the end of the Clone Wars." _Sidious._ The name hissed in each of their minds, colder than their crystallized breath that clouded the air.

"Did Vau like the war?"

Soronna shrugged. Still her attention had not wavered from Mird, who gobbled lump after lump of raw ground meat out of her hand. "He never was very friendly. I didn't know him nearly as well as I knew the others who used the rent the place."

"His family?"

She shook her head. "I really don't know why he was staying with them. A business arrangement, maybe. I-I know all the others hated the war."

Kad was about to ask more about the others, who they were, what they did, when, through his training bond with Master Che, her questing presence called him back. "I have to get home," he whispered to Luke and Leia.

"Thank you. We've got to go," Luke said. "Scourge- I mean Mird, are you coming?"

With an alarmed squeal, Mird launched itself across the small room and smacked into Kad's legs. Hunched and lonely, it huddled close to him the whole way home, where it licked Verp with frantic intensity.

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><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	8. Chapter 8 The Search Continued

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 8: The Search Continued<p>

The Triumvirate knelt in a corner of the gardens, shelling Antarian peas as part of their kitchen duty. Mara was absent, being drilled by Anakin with a battery of exercises meant to make her more patient. The only accomplishment thus far had been to drive both of them up the wall. The Scourge dozed with Verp in a shaft of sunlight on the white-pebbled path nearby.

"We have a name." Leia grinned, brimming with the delight of success. "Vau. An adult human male. We also know what probably happened to him." Her grin vanished.

"So what now?" Luke asked.

"He was arrested by Sidious's flunkies."

"They could have killed him, you know."

Kad shook his head. "No, remember what Obi said? People who were too vocal in their opposition to the war were found dead in their homes. Like that one reporter the police decided died of a drug overdose? If they had killed him, a body would have been found. He was arrested."

Leia grunted in satisfaction as she shelled the last of her peas. "I know where to go for that, too. We should pay Chancellor Organa a visit."

Luke jumped up. "I'll go tell Obi so he can get us in."

"No," Leia interrupted, seizing her brother's arm. "Don't tell him. Don't tell anyone. Not Obi, not Ani, not Master Che, not R2, not even Mara. We're doing this on our own."

"Why?" Luke demanded, starting to get edgy. "It was one thing finding the Scourge's owner alone if he lived in the Lower Levels. It's another thing if he was arrested by the last Sith Lord's guards eleven years ago. Leia, Sidious was dangerous. Haven't you listened to a word Ani's said?"

Despite his slight advantage in size, Leia managed to pulled her brother back to a crouch. "Listen. Just hear me out. They'll all say exactly what you're saying: 'It's too dangerous,' and leave us at home. Ani will start telling us we don't know what we're playing with, and Obi will agree, and Master Che will point blank forbid Kad from having anything to do with it." She raised her voice when Luke tried to say something. "I don't care. We're doing this on our own. The Scourge found us, not Obi or Ani or Master Che. So far, we've figured out a lot more than they have. As soon as there's the slightest hint of Sidious being involved, it becomes a Council Matter. The Council's good, they're wise, they're the best governing body in the galaxy, but this isn't the job for them. It's for us. Get it?"

Luke glared defiantly at her. "No, I don't."

Leia pinned him with a direct, flinty stare. "'Truly wonderful is the mind of a child.' Younglings see things adults don't. They never thought of just plain asking the Scourge where it was from. This is our mission. It's the will of the Force; I know it, so don't bother arguing. And no, you can't back out. You, me, and Kad are in this to the end. Now move it."

Both Luke and Kad bowed to the inevitable and moved.

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><p>The name of a Jedi Master generally was not enough to get an immediate audience with the Chancellor, but when that name was "Obi-Wan Kenobi" and the Chancellor was Bail Prestor Organa, it was enough. Kad and the twins were quickly ushered in by Organa's secretary, the same woman who had worked with him in the Senate for years before even the start of the Clone Wars.<p>

The Chancellor sat behind the desk flipping through a proposed bill to protect the trade of a certain kind of food crop. He radiated frustrated boredom. Kad didn't blame him, as this was the eleventh time in five years that this bill had been proposed and pushed through the lower courts, invariably to land on his desk and get voted down by an increasingly annoyed Senate. The bill's authors seemed to think that if they found just the right combination of words, the bill would pass resoundingly. They appeared to be wrong.

The Chancellor's office was decorated in cool shades of blue, meant to contrast sharply with its former occupant's preference of red. Chancellor Organa glanced up, broke into a smile, and tossed the bill onto a corner of the desk. The datapad's screen cracked. His smile grew slightly.

The three children bowed and dragged the overstuffed couch that graced the corner like a bloated mushroom over to sit on.

"It's nice to see you again. How's Obi-Wan?"

"Likewise, Chancellor. He, Master Skywalker, Master Olin, and Master Che are all fine," Leia answered. The set of her shoulders proclaimed that this visit was all business. They knew Bail Organa and entertained a casual friendship with him. He and Obi were close friends, though Ani kept a wary distance. Chancellor Organa had tutored them in higher level diplomacy and made sure they were well-versed in political doublespeak. Kad liked him well enough.

"Is there something you need?" Organa asked, sliding seamlessly into seriousness, around thing they were grateful for. He took the child Padawans seriously.

"We need the records of every arrest made in the last year of Palpatine's term."

Organa sat back in surprise. "Well. Are the Jedi doing an investigation into those old arrests?"

Leia nodded curtly.

"I've had them looked at myself. The best investigators ran the names through the criminal records of every major planet in the Republic. A few innocents showed up, but most had a legitimate criminal record. You think there's something we missed?"

"Sorry, Chancellor," Leia said with a charming grin to soften the blow. "Jedi business."

Chancellor Organa sat back, shook his head in disbelief, and laughed. "You are the most manipulative child I have ever had the pleasure and/or misfortune to do business with, Leia Amidala. It would be an honor to help your esteemed Order get caught up in yet another hapless wild bantha chase. At your service, Master Jedi." He stood, executed an elegant bow, and crossed the room with the purposeful grace of a useful noble. They followed him into the side rooms which used to secretly house Sidious's Sith holocrons. Now they were storage for old records. Chancellor Organa entered "Arrest Records 19 B.B.Y." into the search console just inside the door. The walls were lined with datacells which housed the records. "Datacell C13," he directed, and pointed them to the right one.

Leia inserted it in her pad and searched the name Vau. One entry was highlighted. The Triumvirate shared a quietly excited glance. Luke set about cajoling the equipment into printing the file. The record was so old that the system repeatedly threw up flags that asked if they were sure they had the right file. Once they had a flimsy version and a copy on each datapad, they excused themselves.

Chancellor Organa felt rather bemused and reluctant for them to leave so quickly. Taking pity on the man, they lingered for half an hour filling him in on Temple gossip, mainly Anakin and Mara's constant strife.

"Ah," Organa said with a wince. "I dread the day Char suddenly decides he hates me." He glanced at a picture of his wife, Queen Breha, and adopted son, Char, a tall boy the twins' age, which hovered over his desk. "Mara doesn't hate Ani," Kad amended, a little bothered by the notion that a Padawan could hate their Master. "She just-"

"-thinks she does," Leia cut in. "She'll get over it."

"I trust your pronouncements, of course," Bail said with a courtly nod of the head. "You know both of them much better than I do. How is your Scourge, by the way?"

"It's breathing," Luke answered with a shrug. "We really do have to go, Chancellor."

"Sorry to abandon you to the produce bill," Leia apologized as they Force-lugged the couch back to its proper place. "Maybe Obi will have mercy on you and drop by later."

"I wish," Bail said, making a most unprincely face. "Say hello to your Masters and Mara. Tell Obi-Wan that I miss his company desperately, and that I'm _not_ running again next year. Statute of limitations and all that." "That's on criminal charges, Chancellor," Leia corrected with an amused smirk.

Bail raised his hands to heaven. "I did this for him. I've done my time, and now I want to retire. Tell him _that_."

"Will do," Leia called as they exited through the anteroom. In the hall, they paused to read the file.

Walon Vau

Age 63

Human Male

Grand theft, assault, murder, **HIGH TREASON**

Alcatraz

The only other information was a set of coordinates.

"That's an impressive record," Luke muttered uneasily. "Are you sure Verp and the Scourge-I mean, Mird-will be safe with him?"

Leia pointed silently to the words High Treason. "The enemy of the enemy-"

"-is not necessarily a friend," Luke said adamantly. "Just ask Ani and Obi. Didn't they tell you about that pirate back during the war?"

"He was arrested for high treason. _High treason._ They only have high treason in absolute monarchies or dictatorships. He was arrested for treason against Palpatine. Still sound like such a bad guy?"

Luke admitted that he didn't. "Alcatraz," he muttered. "A planet, you think?"

"It's where he is," Leia answered, returning her datapad to her belt. "We should enter the coordinates in the Star Room and see where that is," Kad offered. "And check the Archives."

They set off for the Temple. Kad felt afire with near success. It was invigorating. With each step they took, they were closer to finding Mird's master.

"That's really far," Luke muttered in dismay when, late that night, they entered the Alcatraz coordinates in the Star Room. The galaxy flowed past them and then spread out smoothly until one section of space at the far edge was in focus. There was no planet at the coordinates. The closest world was a desolate backwater called Voteb, over a day's hyperspace travel away. Leia studied the empty space intently. "We've still got to go there. It may be a rouge asteroid, it may be a station, it may be- Who knows? What matters is that Mird's Vau is there."

Luke eyed the planet Voteb with resignation that approached gloom. "Obi won't like that at all. Fine. I'll go pack. Public transport?"

"The sooner we leave, the sooner we get back with Mird's dad," Leia affirmed.

Kad resolutely ignored the needling dismay at the thought of running off without telling his Master, or Obi, or Ani. They were already in trouble for their first jaunt into the Lower Levels. He went to his room and quietly packed everything he'd need, including the healing crystal. Looking around his room, he nearly lost his nerve. Master Che would be sick with worry, furious with him for being so reckless. There was no way he could back down, though. Hopefully, he thought as they waited in endless lines, then boarded an interstellar transport, she would come to forgive him someday.

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><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	9. Chapter 9 Alone Across the Galaxy

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 9: Alone Across the Galaxy<p>

The Triumvirate followed a random, criss-cross path across the galaxy at Leia's insistence. They had to throw off any pursuit from the Masters. She seemed to enjoy the adventure. Well, she could afford to. No doubt Ferris had known what they would do before the thought crossed her mind. By not intervening, he signaled his tentative approval.

From one crowded transport to the next, the Padawans inched ever closer to the mysterious emptiness that was called Alcatraz. Finally, after a five day trip that should have taken two, they arrived on the lonely, desolate world of Voteb.

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><p>Sunrises should be beautiful, striking occasions, Kad thought. Coruscant's sunrise gave off the classic oxygen planet's array of soft indigoes and hopeful golds. On Vorzyd V, the dawn blazed with hard but gorgeous metallic bronzes and coppers. On Atzerri, it was a gentle, loving lightening from the deep blue of night to the pale blue of the day. He had seen a hundred sunrises on a hundred worlds, each slightly different but wonderful just the same. But Voteb's sunrise was <em>ugly<em>. The capital city's pervasive shroud of smog tinted with the sickly yellow of a half-healed bruise. Acrid, chemical stenches pervaded the air. Kad felt as if each breath infected his lungs with a withering disease. He knew there was an older Padawan who was from Voteb. What a mercy that she had been rescued from this horrible place!

The Jedi covered their mouths and noses with their hoods while they darted about the dismal spaceport, seeking a suitable ship. The locals, mainly humans but with a sizable Chagrian population, were readily identifiable by the sallow tint to their skin and the dry coughing spasms that racked their bodies. Nevertheless, most clung to life and their property with a ruthless tenacity.

Luke spotted the ship docked in the yard under Voteb's lifeless sky. It was a large, serviceable personal vessel with engines in good repair. The words etched on the side proclaimed it the _Lucky Vengeance_. Now mildly excited, Luke opened the ship's ramp with the Force and they boarded for an inspection. Human-adapted controls, several bunkrooms, a well-stocked galley and first aid kit. Everything they could want.

Luke scrambled eagerly into the pilot seat. Kad dropped into the copilot chair as his friend rapidly ran them through the takeoff sequence. Just as the engines were firing smoothly, a figure that had been walking at a leisurely pace down the concourse began to run. The _Vengeance_'s engines drowned out the human man's words, but from his wide eyes and gaping mouth, "Hey! That's my ship!" were probably safe guesses. Luke pulled them into an agile upward angling that was almost a leap, right over the man's head. They shot into the sickly sky with the unfortunate pilot shaking his fist and howling curses below them. Only when they had made the jump to hyperspace did the Triumvirate relax.

"We just committed grand theft starship," Luke said, as breathless as he would be if they'd run out of the atmosphere and into space.

Leia grinned a little lopsidedly. "Admit it. You enjoyed it."

"I like her handling," her brother admitted.

"Now that was flying," Leia announced emphatically. She pulled out her copy of Vau's file and scanned it. "Now it gets interesting."

* * *

><p>In the middle of the night, Coruscant time, they arrived at Alcatraz. Luke manned the <em>Vengeance<em>'s sensors while Leia and Kad dozed in one of the cabins. Nevertheless, they started immediately to wakefulness at Luke's somber call. "There it is," he said, pointing to the image on the screen. The scanners detected life among the emptiness of space. It was not just another dead asteroid.

"Right where the file says it should be," Kad muttered. Somehow, that struck him as ominous. He remembered Ani's words on Sidious. _"It was just small things that felt off, at first. I remember that his Red Guard's uniforms matched the color of his carpet, and that struck me as more sinister than any of his smooth words. Look out for the little things. If they set off alarm bells, then _listen_."_ "Sith," he said, the conviction of a premonition behind it.

In the dim light from the screen, Luke and Leia's faces shone pale and young, not at all ready for this. _But we are ready for it_, he told himself firmly. _We'd better be._

"Play along for now, we will," Leia announced. Straightening, she looked out the viewport at the approaching shape as one would at an old enemy. "That's an asteroid base out there, maybe an old prison. Hail them, Luke, and let me do the talking. Follow my lead."

Luke contacted the base via the com. After a few minutes of static and repeated "Alcatraz, respond," the other end crackled and a human voice relayed over the com. "This is Alcatraz answering your transmission. Who is this?"

Leia leaned over the com. "We come in the name of the new order," she replied in a voice as frosty and dead as the spaces between stars.

Silence from the com, then the man's response. "We welcome you, sir. Do you come from Lord Sidious?" The Triumvirate exchanged a shocked glance at the barely controlled emotion and-there was no other word for it-_hope_ in his voice, as if he had dreamed of such a day for years.

"Yes," Leia answered coldly. "We are dark acolytes with orders to inspect your base. Prepare to receive us."

"Yes, my Lord."

If Kad had not by now fallen into mission mentality, he would have felt dizzy. As if was, he settled into a quiet inner state not unlike the ready stance of a lightsaber form. In this mindset, a Jedi was ready to extend a welcoming hand or a defensive punch, to offer peace first but follow up quickly with action, to react as needed to any given situation. Pragmatically he knew that this was not a place for lightsabers and flashy Force use, but for stealth. If Vau was indeed here, they were on the verge of performing a jailbreak.

"We're dark acolytes sent by Sidious," Leia warned as Luke piloted the ship toward the desolate hunk of rock. "I'm the highest-ranked, so I give the orders. If they ask about Sidious, be vague. They almost certainly know the Republic won the war, but they probably think Sidious survived the Jedi coup. We were sent by him, and that's all they have to know."

"Too bad we didn't bring dark robes," Kad said, examining his pale brown over-robe and tan tunic. "These are very Jedi."

"We are Sith," Leia stated, deadpan. "We survive. We blend in. Just act like a dark Force-user, and they won't think twice about the clothes." They peered out the viewport. From several thousand kilometers away, the asteroid appeared barren and lifeless. As the distance shrank to hundreds of kilometers, though, a gap appeared in one of the craters and quickly widened. The base or prison was carved out of the asteroid itself. Luke smoothly eased the ship into the hangar and touched down. The disguised doors slid shut above them, the motion accompanied by the protesting scream of disused durasteel.

They shared a mutually fortifying three-way look, the physical equivalent of a fatalistic, "Ready or not…." Their gangway lowered. Kad thought back to the semester of acting lessons they had in spy class when he was five. His features settled into a mask of coldness. He and Luke fell into place behind Leia as she marched down the gangway into the frigid hangar. A human male in shabby military dress stood a respectful few meters from their ship. Graying hair and a lined face hinted at a man in his late fifties at least. He gazed at them with a feverish light in his eyes, like a dehydrated being stopping an oasis on the horizon exactly where they thought it would be. He saluted formally, the movement swift and precise with controlled enthusiasm. Their youth and light clothes did not dampen his respect in the least. Leia watched him silently. "Right this way, my Lords," he intoned, and strode briskly down out of the hangar.

The corridor was roughhewn, lined with low doors. An alarmed code pad secured each door from all but authorized access. Each portal had a small slot at the bottom. Outside several bowls that had been licked clean showed the remains of mealtime. So it was a prison.

The man, apparently the commanding officer of Alcatraz, led them to a door at the end of a hall. The room beyond it was carpeted and heated. Guards, all of them older human males, lounged on the couches, played Sabacc and dejarik, or engaged in a darts competition. "Everyone out!" the commander barked. The guards began to grumble as they climbed lethargically to their feet.

Leia shouldered her way past the commander, sweeping back her cloak so that her lightsaber was evident. "Leave us," she ordered, deadly quiet. The men snapped to attention and filed swiftly out.

The Triumvirate entered the guard lounge. Leia made a point of inspecting the various furniture before, with mild contempt, choosing to remain standing. "Your men's lack of hospitality is regrettable," she remarked coolly.

"They will be punished, my Lord," the commander promised immediately.

"That will not be necessary. What is your name, commander?" "Commander Darvi Sabine, my Lord. My men and I are at your service."

"Yes, you are," Leia said caustically. "We were not sent to exchange pleasantries, Commander Sabine. This is a prisoner transfer."

"Of course, my Lord." Sabine hesitated, torn. He leaned forward, hands clasped behind his back until the knuckles turned white. "Lord Sidious is alive, my Lord? He will restore the galaxy to rights soon?"

Leia smiled slowly, the look of a predator who sees a vulnerability in its prey. "Did you doubt Lord Sidious, Sabine? I find your lack of faith disturbing."

Sabine straightened to a ramrod salute. "No, my Lord. I never doubted it." His voice held the unwavering certainty of either a seer or a fanatic.

"A new day is on the verge of dawning, commander. Your loyalty will be most richly rewarded."

"Thank you, my Lord." Sabine relished each word of gratitude.

Leia returned to business. "We require custody of the prisoner Walon Vau, sentenced for high treason. Bring him to us at once."

Sabine lingered in the doorway, reluctant to leave their presence. "Just Vau, my Lord? Do you require any of his three coconspirators as well?"

"What did I say?"

"Right away, my Lord."

The door closed behind him. Leia sent a pulse through the Force. _Check for listening devices._ The three scoured the room, investigating all the likely and unlikely places: the intersection between walls, the undersides of furniture, the dejarik equipment. Finding none, they relaxed marginally. "They have Vau here," Luke said, grinning a little. "We've really done it. We found him across the whole galaxy."

"These creeps have been here for at least eleven years," Leia observed as she examined the threadbare couch. "Enough to drive anyone a little crazy, I guess, but still. Sabine looks at us like we're the divining light of the galaxy."

"He's obviously a fanatic," Kad pointed out. He actually felt some small modicum of sympathy for the man. A very remote sympathy to be sure, likely the result of his healer's heightened empathy. "We should probably look into these coconspirators of his too. Just in case."

"I thought we were just freeing him," Luke interjected. "It's not like we're going to just forget this place once we leave. Obviously we'll report it to the Council and the Senate. This must break some law somewhere."

They waited in silence. Kad sat on the floor, but stood once he sensed Sabine returning with another presence. The door opened. Sabine began to step inside, but Leia held up a peremptory hand.

"Leave us, Commander Sabine, and be sure that no one disturbs us." He nodded. "Of course, my Lord."

A brutal shove sent the inmate with him stumbling through the doorway, tripping over the binders on his ankles, unable to balance himself with his similarly bound hands. The door shut. The man managed to catch himself. He stood, a gaunt silhouette, face hidden by dirty snarls of hair. His shoulders hunched. The thick gray jumpsuit he wore concealed most of his body, but even through its cold-resistant padding, the trembling in his legs was evident. Kad fought the urge to go help him. First they had to learn how things stood.

The man slowly raised his head, the motion stiff and painful. His shoulders resisted the straightening, but he forced them into a squared position and braced his legs as wide as the binders allowed to keep his balance. He shook the overlong hair out of his eyes to reveal the granite-like face of a hard man who had grown too old too quickly. Dark eyes immobilized them at a glance. He was not a man in control, and not a man defeated. Rather, he was a man who long ago ceased to care whether he won or lost, but who still harbored an iron sense of self-worth that refused to compromise. You could beat him to the point of death, but he would not bow down. "What now?" he rasped in a voice hoarse with disuse.

The three Padawans were silent. Even from a distance, Kad sensed the currents of his body, how wrong they were: dammed and strangled from years of neglect, the muscles atrophying, skin gone ashen from lack of sun or starlight. He swallowed hard. Yes, he had seen people die before. He had killed before, in fact. A criminal with an innocent hostage met death on the point of his lightsaber when he was barely eleven. Still, death was final, clean and quick with a weapon like a lightsaber, almost a mercy. Prisoners at Alcatraz did not die. They languished until they faded away.

Luke took a step forward. "Are you Walon Vau?"

The man nodded shortly.

Luke breathed out through his nose. "We're Jedi. We're here to rescue you."

Vau stared flatly. "Why would _jetiise_ want to rescue me?"

The three children each spoke broken _Mando'a_, with an average vocabulary of perhaps two hundred words. _Jetiise_: Jedi, plural.

"We found your strill," Luke admitted.

"Mird?" Vau's head jerked back; he blinked rapidly several times as if an unexpected flybuzz had landed on his nose. "It's alive?" His voice fell to nearly a whisper.

Luke nodded. "We'll explain everything once we get out of here." Vau's gaze had gone inward. His eyes were glazed, emotionless, but tears glittered at the corners nevertheless. At last he focused on them, still without feeling.

Luke gestured at each of them in turn. "I'm Luke Amidala. This is my sister, Leia Amidala, and Kad Skir'ta."

Vau looked briefly at the twins, but as Luke introduced Kad and his attention lighted on the older boy, his eyes widened. Disbelief, the first real emotion he had displayed, cracked his granite mask of a face. "_Kad'ika_?" he croaked, disbelieving. The man's heart labored loudly enough for its rhythm to carry on currents of the Force to Kad's senses across the room.

Kad's mouth went dry. "Do I know you?" he asked, alarmed.

Vau studied him. With a sigh he withdrew from the emotional ledge he had neared. "I guess not. So what's the plan here? Aren't you three a little young to be out here on your own? How old are you?"

"We're eleven," Luke answered. "Kad's twelve."

Vau's eyes flicked to Kad again. Rattled, Kad clasped his hands behind his back. "Have the _jetiise_ become that much worse in the last…it must be eleven years, then. You're kids."

Leia refused to be cowed. "Our Masters don't know we're here. They weren't irresponsible enough to send us alone, if that's what you're thinking. Why do you care?"

Vau shrugged. "It's all the same to me." He looked around the furnished room, lip curled in disgust. "Got a plan for getting me off this rock?"

"Prison transfer," Leia answered simply.

Vau jerked his head to emphasize the bulky mechanical collar cinched around his neck. "Might be a bit difficult, what with how I'll blow up and all."

Leia drew her lightsaber.

"_Hey._" Vau raised his cuffed hands in objection as she advanced on him.

"Don't worry. Low setting. See?" She showed him the power knob on her hilt. "Just stand still." Tongue slicking out slightly, she held the lightsaber up and inched the tip closer to the collar. Vau closed his eyes, teeth clenched. The collar sizzled where the saber touched it. The metal glowed forge-orange while Leia gingerly melted through it. Just as the heat was about to burn Vau's skin, Kad snapped the collar's new shatterpoint with a telekinetic thrust. Leia snatched the lightsaber away. Vau shook his head mightily, throwing the collar off. So weak were his muscles that he staggered and nearly fell. Kad managed to catch him.

"Thanks," the Mandalorian muttered. Using Kad as a support, he levered himself back into a sturdy stance. "Can we get off this rock now?" "You have three…coconspirators who are also here," Luke offered carefully. "Do you want us to free them too?"

Vau went still. "Here?" he whispered, more to himself than anyone else. "They were here the whole _shabla_ time?" He looked down at Luke from eyes like coals backlit by a distant fire. "Yes. Get them."

Leia directed the boys to take Vau to the ship while she arranged the additional transfers. Vau could just barely hobble in the restraints, but he insisted on walking on his own. The Padawans maintained their Sith personas all the way onto the ship.

"Back room," Luke ordered in the featureless monotone of a mindless automaton.

Vau limped into the cabin, where he collapsed facedown onto the lower bunk. Kad watched him covertly through the crack between the door and the wall before letting it slide shut. He joined Luke in the cockpit. Nervous bubbles formed in his veins, coalescing in the center of his chest, where they foamed in nameless dread. He and Luke stared silently at one another across the scant half meter between the two seats.

"He knows me," Kad said at last. "Or…he thinks he does."

"And you don't know him?" Luke ventured.

"You _know_ I don't," Kad said. "How could I? He's been in prison since the end of the Clone Wars!"

Luke frowned as he looked out the viewport. "I don't know. Both him and Mird recognizing you? Too big a coincidence." He twisted to look at his friend. "Anyway, you were born before the Clone Wars ended."

"Yeah," Kad snorted. "If you count a little more than a year when…." He trailed off. "You think he knows me from before the Temple."

Luke attempted a weak smile. "Maybe. But…do you think getting these 'coconspirators' too is a bad idea? Did you see the look on his face when he said, 'Get them'?"

It was all too much. Kad's insides roiled as he desperately tried to solve a puzzle with half the pieces missing. He gladly turned to the distraction. "Good point. From the way he feels, he could very well have a grudge against them he wants to settle. We'd better keep them all apart until we sort this out."

"Maybe they owe him money," Luke theorized. The conversation continued in this vein until the gangway lowered again. They watched from the viewport as, one by one, the prisoners were led onto the ship and locked in separate rooms.

First came a tall human woman, her height merely lending to her cadaverous appearance. Long pale hair straggled down her back. She hobbled only slightly less than Vau, likely due to being only in her mid-thirties as opposed to her seventies. Hardship stretched her pallid skin tight across her face, accentuating the angles to the extreme, but the echoes of a once striking beauty remained around her mouth and eyes. She kept her head up and looked neither left nor right until she was swallowed by the _Vengeance_'s gangway.

Next came a blue-skinned Twi'lek female, of perhaps similar age, whose headtails listed heavily down her back, a sign of extreme deprivation. She too ignored the guards who stood at attention in honor of the departing ship. Deep lines carved their evidence of bitter loss around her eyes.

Lastly, a smaller human man with a crippling limp crossed the wide hangar. Unlike the others, his eyes roved the cavernous space nonstop, searching. Only Leia's insistent taps with her lightsaber hilt between his shoulder blades kept him from pausing on the gangway to crane his neck and peer around.

The entry hatch closed with a resounding clang. All the guards present, perhaps twenty-five, formed up and saluted in unison. Their faces were professionally emotionless, their bodies unbending in a ritual that spoke of absolute devotion.

Leia joined the boys in the cockpit. "Let's get out of here," she whispered. Luke levered the ship into the air and soared out of the hangar, away from the asteroid and the horrible place of endless waiting that was Alcatraz.


	10. Chapter 10 Reunion

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Chapter 10: Reunion<p>

Luke stood by the closed door to the cockpit, ready to burst out and intervene if the people in the next room came to blows. Kad and Leia sat together on the floor, knees touching. The Force flowed between them like blood through joined veins, in a rare case of shared meditation with Leia. Kad knew, though he could not say how, that somehow his life was about to change drastically. Whether the change was good or bad he couldn't tell, so he sought the hush of meditation to steady his thoughts and prepare him for it.

The emotions of those outside had grown from world-weary resignation to surprise, distrust, guarded optimism, then a reawakening of hope so painful their hearts felt like they cracked in two as Luke explained their situation to them, one by one. Now they were reunited.

They were a family. No other conclusion could be drawn from the intimate, devastating sorrow and scarred delight that boiled in the other room. Their low voices didn't carry through the door, but ragged sobs reached the Padawans' ears, and heartbroken laughter. Luke abandoned his post after three minutes to join his friends in meditation. There was no need for a guard on these people. Any monitoring of such an emotional, vulnerable reunion would have been an intrusion of the most callous kind. The Triumvirate sat cross-legged on the small floor space of the cockpit, knees touching in a triangle, and mingled their awareness to the point that individual identities were slippery and easily forgotten. The reunion outside hummed like a beautiful, mournful ballad. They cast their net of awareness beyond the narrow confines of the _Vengeance_, out through the crystalline pathways of the Force, down training bonds, until their Masters' positions could be ascertained. Ferris slipped away like vapor, as always, but Obi-Wan shone like a beacon from distant Coruscant. Through him, they detected to a lesser extent Anakin, and through him Mara. Master Che, however, was passing _less than three parsecs_ from them as she retraced their route with the driven determination of a hunter. They ducked back into themselves with a jolt, just barely avoiding her detection. Kad came to himself when his head cracked on the edge of the control panel as his body jerked in reaction.

"She's going to kill me," he heard himself say. "Can't we com her, let her know we're here?"

"Better not," Leia muttered, still slightly cross-eyed from their sudden reentry. "She'll unleash fury and Force lightning on us, probably drag us back to the Temple, and never let us leave her sight again."

"Then we'd never learn what…they know," Luke added from where he lay sprawled on the floor, with no apparent desire to move.

A knock on the door had them all on their feet. Vau peered in. His eyes flickered to Kad and lingered, but moved on quickly to Luke and Leia, whom he scrutinized for a time as well. "Mind if we shower, get some food?"

"Not at all," Leia answered. "There are probably even some clothes that fit you, if you check the drawers in the main cabin."

Vau looked sideways at her. "You don't know?"

She shrugged. "It's not our ship."

A wicked grin briefly turned up the corners of his mouth. It would not be an overstatement to say that Kad and Luke were shocked. They had seen less than ten straight minutes of him, but already they knew what a rarity such a display was. Vau must have been very happy indeed. "You know, Leia Amidala, I could grow to like you." He vanished from the doorway. "Should I be enthused?" Leia wondered aloud.

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><p>The subsequent showers lasted for five hours and used up every dollop of shampoo and soap on the ship. Then the escapees browsed among the legal owner's wardrobe at length. Only after they were clean and clothed, with hair sheered to manageable length in three cases, did they set upon the ration packs with the careful voraciousness of career soldiers. Kad watched, again covertly, as they spooned hot soup into their mouths. He was pleased that they all knew to limit themselves, despite their ravenous hunger. They were half-starved, after all, had been for eleven years.<p>

The tall human woman shoved her empty food pack across the floor and stretched her arms luxuriously over her head, savoring the freedom. "If that's it, then why don't we get some sleep?" A giddy grin broke across her face. "Laseema, did you see? They have _pillows_!" She and the Twi'lek grinned at one another, so delighted by the concept.

The smaller man with the limp nodded. "That sounds heavenly, Besany."

Vau held up a skeletal hand to stop them. "Not yet. First, there's something you all need to see." He raised his voice. "Hey, Jedi! Come here!"

Kad, Luke, and Leia exchanged a glance. "Why do I feel like I'm about to step off a cliff?" Kad asked.

Leia squeezed his hand. "You're not. Let's go see what he wants." Together they entered the small sitting room. The three newcomers looked them up and down, the females uncomprehending.

The smaller man turned white. "_Shab_," he whispered.

"What? Kal, what-" the human woman named Besany asked, but broke off when she followed his gaze to Kad. She studied him closely, then raised a hand to her mouth in silent shock.

The Twi'lek, Laseema, looked back and forth. "Kal, what is it?"

"You know me," Kad said in as steady a voice as he could muster. "Don't you?"

The man nodded, tears flowing freely from his eyes. "You're alive. Oh, _shab_, you're alive! _Kad'ika_-", the words a caress.

"Who are you?"

Laseema stared at him, eyes round with amazement. "_Kad'ika_…?" she whispered, like Vau had, unsure.

The one called Kal was certain. He stood and limped painfully across the room to wrap the bewildered Jedi Padawan in a bony but tight hug. "It's all right, _ad'ika_. It's all right."

"But who are you?" Kad asked, even as he returned the hug. How could he not, when the man was brimming over with joy and loss? The old man's shoulder blades stabbed out of the sick, papery skin of his back, into Kad's encircling forearms.

Kal pulled back so he could look at Kad's face. He was only a few inches taller than the preadolescent boy. "Sorry to startle you, _ad'ika_." A rueful smile quirked his face. "My name is Kal Skirata. I'm your grandfather."

"It's a long story," Kal said wearily. He returned to a sprawl-legged position on the floor. One leg he stretched out straight in front of him. The other he held at an angle carefully balanced between awkwardness and pain. The enormous shirt and pants he wore, much too large for his starved frame, enveloped him like a tent.

Kad sat slowly, head abuzz, Luke and Leia close by on either side. He'd heard of Jedi meeting relatives by chance on missions, but the stories never seemed to end well. The strangers always parted ways with an unbreachable distance like a chasm between them. This was his grandfather. _He called me _Kad'ika_. I'm Mandalorian?_

"Fierfek, you're alive!" Kal whispered hoarsely as the realization swept over him again. Besany put a comforting arm around his shoulders.

"You're Mandalorian, aren't you?" Kad asked.

A horrible, frozen grief warped Kal's Force presence. "You wouldn't know about that. Right."

Kad was about to ask what was wrong when Laseema cut in. Her eyes had narrowed until they were flinty shards. "You don't know anything about us, do you?"

"Are you-"

"I'm your aunt. So is Besany. Vau's…." She paused, fishing for an accurate description.

"He's clan, anyway," Kal put in.

"Clan Skirata? Not Skir'ta?"

Kal winced at the mangling of his surname.

"I don't understand," Kad said, intonation bordering on pleading. "The Jedi stole you," Laseema stated, hard and bitter.

Kad was appalled. "No, they didn't. I was found abandoned in the Lower Levels-"

Vau snorted derisively. "That's what they told you, then. There was a Jedi there when we are arrested by Old Slimy's goons. Human male, light skin, black dreadlocks, a gold stripe across his nose."

Quinlan Vos? Kad pulled his knees up against his chest. "Okay, _he _might steal a baby," he admitted. "But if he did, no one else knew about it!" "You sure?" Vau asked from where he sat, on the counter of all places, legs extended in front of him, arms crossed behind his head. "Liars, Jedi. All of them."

"Ani and Obi would never lie to me!" Kad protested vehemently. "Neither would Master Che or Ferris or-"

"They stole you," Laseema repeated dourly.

"Cut it out," Kal interjected firmly. "_Las'ika_, remember, Jedi are the only family he's ever known. We are _not_ going to insult them to his face or behind his back."

Vau sat up straight. "Who are you, and what have you done with Kal?" he demanded in complete seriousness.

Kal leaned back against the wall with a sigh. "It's we, Walon, and you _shabla_ well know it."

"You look like Kal, you talk like Kal, but you sure as chaos don't sound like him. You _hate_ Jedi, remember?"

Kad felt sick. He wanted to cry, to leave the room, to flee to Obi's gentle reassurances or Ani's agonized commiseration, to hear a story of happy ordinary lives, of parents who were sad but knew letting him go was the right thing to do, brothers and sisters happy to say their sibling was a Jedi, a family that was proud of his life. Kal seemed like a nice man; Kad didn't want his hate or scorn.

Kal fixed Vau with a steady stare in return. "The last eleven years, Walon, I haven't known a thing about what happened to anyone. I must have run nightmare scenarios through my head a quintillion times for every single one of us. Did they kill _Kad'ika_, did they hurt him, did they do something even worse to him? And here I see my grandson, after all this time, and he's all right. That's all I care about. If the Jedi have given him a good home, even if I don't agree with them on most things, then I'll drop to my knees in front of the worst of them and thank them from the bottom of my heart."

Vau stared in genuine shock. "You're insane." He jabbed a finger at Kad. "That boy right there has no idea he's _Mando_. No sense of his history or culture, no idea of his clan. He's even got his own name wrong. He's _dar'manda_, Kal, because of to the _jetiise_. And you're going to _thank _them for that?"

Kal went deadly quiet. "Shut up, Walon. Just shut up, right now, before someone gets hurt. No one is going to talk about Kad like that. Ever." He and the other man stared at one another, unwavering, the way Jedi stared as they prowled through the assessment phase that preceded every duel. Laseema, jaw clenched, watched. It was obvious whose side she was on.

Besany interrupted. "Kal's right about one thing, Walon. This isn't fair to Kad. Let's at least explain, please."

"Right," Kal said, and turned his back on Vau. "Sorry about that, _Kad'ika_. And…sorry, what are your names?" He directed his attention to the twins.

"Luke and Leia Amidala," Luke answered quietly, unnerved by the crackling tension in the room.

Kal smiled at them. He had a very inviting smile, as if he opened his arms to allow them in. "Like the Senator? There was one, way back in the war. Decent girl, from what I heard. She a relation?"

Leia shrugged dismissively. "We wouldn't know." The statement hung in the air as a stark reminder of the Jedi taboo on families.

"She was from the same planet as we are, anyway," Luke interjected. Kal nodded slowly. "Right. Are you three good friends?"

"We've been friends since I arrived at the Temple," Kad said, half in reassurance and half in defense against Vau's scorn and Laseema's outright blame. "They're the best friends I could ever have." He looked from Vau to Laseema. For a brief moment, the fierceness that rarely emerged except when he went All Out sharpened his features.

Kal kept himself from asking more. He yearned to know about his grandson's life, but knew that to be fair to him, he had to hear their story first. He grinned at Luke and Leia. "In that case, feel free to stay. It's…quite a story."

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><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	11. Chapter 11 Family is a Dangerous Thing

**I do not own Star Wars. Oh, I forgot to mention, Master Che I got from Karen Miller's book _Wild Space._ A few other characters appear in other books (like Master Caudle Ilena Xan from _Yoda: Dark Rendezvous_) that I included for a sense of continuity. So if you find any of them on Wookieepedia, they are not mine.**

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><p>Chapter 11: Family is a Dangerous Thing<p>

Okay, let's start at the beginning. I was a training sergeant for eight years on Kamino, for the Fett clones. So was Walon. I trained one hundred four commandos, plus six Nulls. The Nulls were the first clones that Kaminoans tried to produce, but they messed with the genes too much and made them "deviant" and "unpredictable." I rescued them from being put down and adopted them as my sons. Adoption is a common thing to do for Mandalorians. I taught them and all my commandos the _Mando_ culture, gave them names, and pretty much raised them as my kids.

After Geonosis, I kept track of all of them, but your dad's squad, Omega, was the one I was closest to. His name is Darman. They first met your mom on an undercover mission near the start of the war. Her name was Etain Tur-Mukan. She was a Jedi Padawan at the time, later a Knight. Our family had quite a few adventures, but I won't get into that.

We spent the whole war trying to keep the clan together. Besides your parents and everyone here, there were your uncles, all clones: Fi, Atin, Niner, Corr, Ordo, Mereel, Prudii, Kom'rk, Jaing, and A'den. And Bardan Jusik, a former Jedi. Besany is Ordo's wife, and Laseema is Atin's.

Your mom was a sweet, well-meaning girl. She wasn't very strong in the Force, so she was never very confident in herself. She really loved your dad, though, and wanted to give him a legacy, so she had you. You were born on Mandalore, but we lived on Coruscant to be close to your uncles. Your dad didn't know you were his until you were almost a year old. He loved you right away, though.

Then, after you and your parents had only a few hours as a family, Etain was deployed to Kashyyk. She was killed. That was what really did it. We had been considering deserting for some time, but it took the death of one of our own to drive home that we weren't invulnerable. Even then, we didn't learn. We were stupid. We all stayed in one apartment the night before deserting to Mandalore. It wouldn't have been a problem, but somewhere along the way we made a mistake, left a clue, trusted the wrong person….

In the middle of the night, a Black Ops squad and a Jedi attacked the apartment. We were all captured. We were shipped off to that prison, and never heard anything about anyone.

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><p>"That's the short version," Kal concluded.<p>

Kad tried without success to take it all in. _My mom was a Jedi? My dad was a clone? I wasn't abandoned? A Jedi really stole me? _

He looked up at Kal, who smiled tearfully at him. He didn't want to ask it; it would hurt them so much if they were wrong, but he had to be sure. "How do you know for sure that I am your grandson?"

Kal shrugged. "You look just like your parents. You have your _buir_'s-your father's hair and eyes, and definitely his ears, but your mother's face and build."

Kad had never been told he looked like anyone. To his surprise, the idea hurt. He moved to sit beside Kal. "Your leg hurts."

Kal shifted said appendage and winced at the flare of magma that shot up his bones.

Kad put a hand over it and flexed it gently. "I'm guessing…a break that healed wrong. In the knee." He looked up. "I'm a healer. Not a very good one, but I can help. When we get home, my Master-"

"Fierfek!" Vau exploded. Kad nearly jumped out of his skin. He twisted to stare in shock at the man on the counter. He glared coldly down at them. "Don't mind me. I'll just lie up here quietly reliving our lives falling to pieces. _Shab_, you have a Master?"

Kad wasn't sure what the big deal was, but Laseema also scowled at the revelation. "What's he like, this Master?"

"She's the Master Healer of the Order."

Vau whistled. "Prestigious. If she wanted to train you, why are you saying you're no good? That would make you about the best of the best." Kad flushed uncomfortably. "She just took me because she likes me. But when we get home, she and the other healers will be able to help."

Kal nodded and leaned back with a sigh, already tired from the emotional upheaval of the last half hour. Probing the man's leg, Kad realized that it wouldn't improve with the usual sessions. The knee would have to be rebroken. He shuddered.

"You'd all probably better go to bed," he urged. Their weariness weighed heavily on the room like smog.

"Not yet," Kal said. "The war ended, didn't it?"

"Right after I arrived at the Temple."

"What happened to the GAR? The clone army?"

Kad recalled vaguely the first hectic months after the war ended, with Jedi running here and there, weary and harried but quietly triumphant. He had been puzzled by Ani's wide grin as he shot into their nursery to tell them that Rex and Cody and the others were okay, and by the sudden bursts of relieved laughter that sometimes filled the halls, and by previously grave-faced Mace Windu who was sighted humming to himself as he headed toward a Council meeting. Lots had happened then. The fate of the army, though, had been a major part of it, as big as the political turmoil and the final rooting out of Sith artifacts.

"The Council got Bail Organa to run for Chancellor after Sidious-I mean Palpatine-was killed. Then he and the rest of the Delegation of Two Thousand got the Military Dissolution Act passed. It dissolved the army, and got the clones-" He ticked the provisions off on his fingers as he struggled to remember the one bill Obi-Wan had ever deigned to like. "-full citizenship, pensions, veterans' benefits, and a treatment to halt the rapid aging. And four mandatory years of college education."

Vau laughed so hard at the last one that he nearly rolled off the counter. "Imagine Sev in a college classroom…writing essays…turning in _papers_!" He wiped an imaginary tear from his eye.

Kal smiled drowsily. "That's good, then."

Kad climbed purposefully to his feet, now the healer and therefore dominant power in the equation. "You are going to bed. Now. Guys, help me."

They somehow got all four into the bunks in the two separate cabins, though some judicious Force use was required to get the weak Vau and Besany onto the top berths. Once that was accomplished, they retreated to the cabin. The stars were a warped blur outside the viewport.

"Two days until we're home," Luke announced after looking over the instruments.

Silence descended as they looked at one another. If it hadn't been for their Force bond, Kad would have felt like an outsider among those he knew best. As it was, the empty space where words should have been filled him with unease.

"So what should we do with them once we get back?" he asked to fill the void.

Leia's eyes sharpened like they did when she was at her most determined. These people were under her protection, and she would fight to the death to deliver them safely home. "We take them to the Temple, and have the healers help them there. If Master Windu wants to get up in arms about it, he'll have to just get over it."

Kad pulled out his healing crystal and rubbed its clear-cut sides until its smoothness grew smeared from the repeated touch of his fingertips. "So what do you think of my…grandfather?"

"I like him," Leia answered readily. "He seems nice."

"I'm Mandalorian? I have a clan?" He meant to state them as facts, but they came out as bewildered questions.

Luke leaned back on the console and turned his head to contemplate the viewport. "Wow."

Kad supposed there really was nothing else to say.

* * *

><p>The next two days had them at close quarters with the remnants of Clan Skirata. The relationship between these people was fascinating to Kad. A charged silence hung between Kal and Vau. When Vau asked about more about Chancellor Organa and learned that Obi-Wan had specifically asked him to run for office, he said, "There you go, Kal. Jedi-approved," in a patronizing tone of voice, but with the air of someone poking an animal with a stick to see if it was really asleep or not. Kal let the comment breeze on by. There was an old grudge between the two, as he had sensed the night before when Vau called him <em>dar'manda<em>-whatever that meant-and Kal threatened the other man in earnest, but that grudge had been set aside for the sake of something else. Kad wouldn't have figured them as friends if he saw them on the street. Their interaction resembled more that of brothers who loved one another but didn't necessarily like one another. They traded barbed remarks and teasing jibes, scowled when one of the comments hit its mark, reminisced shamelessly.

Besany busied herself with guarding Kal and Vau to keep them in line. She focused in a respectable down-to-landside manner, but her efforts distracted her from something she dared not think about. Kad realized it must be her husband, Ordo.

Laseema was peaceable unless the topic of Jedi came up. Then she glowered, as stiff as warped wood. She fired questions at Kad whenever he came near. "I suppose they didn't let you keep your stuffed nerf, did they?" No stuffed animals cropped up in his memory, just various toys meant to sharpen reflexes and enhance Force-use, and the multicolored hands of his Krayt Dragon clan mates reaching for the ball.

She snorted at the blank look on his face. "Figures." She rubbed her aching back with arthritic arms.

"Why does that bother you so much?" he asked, mystified by her angry cynicism. She looked up at him. Her listless lekku stirred unhappily. "When Etain wasn't there, I looked after you. I'm the one who raised you." The swell of bitter sadness from her choked him. "Now you don't know me at all."

He had to leave the room.

The four beings drew together in the face of the loss of their clan and the years they might have had, which Kad knew he reminded them of with every move he made. They knitted themselves more firmly into a familial unit, though they made no effort to fill in the gaps left by the eleven missing. All deferred to Kal as the leader, even Vau in an offhand, unconscious sort of way.

Watching them, Kad felt like a breeze ruffled the hair on the nape of his neck. Something almost familiar teased the corners of his mind, but invariably slipped away when he reached for it. _If I do know them, I don't know it._ Sad that he couldn't tell them straight out, "Yes, I remember you," he threw himself into easing their physical aches as best he could.

Kal sighed in relief as he soothed the fiery catch in his knee away. "Thanks, _Kad'ika_. You're a wonder."

"I wish I could do more…Grandfather."

Kal looked up at him from the bottom bunk where he sprawled. He had blue eyes, similar in hue to Obi-Wan's, but with an electric glint more reminiscent of Anakin than anyone else Kad knew. Kal smiled raggedly. "Do you speak _Mando'a_, _Kad'ika_?"

He shook his head.

"'Grandfather' is _Babuir_."

"_Babuir_," Kad repeated.

Kal blinked as tears burned in his eyes and looked away. "You used to call me 'Baboo.'" He looked up again, almost desperate. "Have they been good to you, _Kad'ika_? Are you happy?"

"Yes," Kad answered earnestly. "I have the best friends, the best Master, good teachers-"

"Are they angry with you when you do something wrong, or dangerous?"

"Yes," he admitted wryly. "I'd rather they weren't."

Kal nodded as if that was a good sign. "Good. I look forward to meeting this Master of yours." He leaned back against the pillows. His eyes drifted closed. "Maybe your _jetiise _friends will help find my sons."

"If they won't," Kad whispered into the silence after Kal fell asleep, "I think we will."

* * *

><p>The <em>Lucky Vengeance<em> hailed the Jedi Temple at 3:00 A.M., Coruscant time. Luke hung up with an aggrieved wince. "Master Ban-yaro answered. He said we're in trouble."

Indeed they were. When they docked their stolen ship in one of the hangars, Obi-Wan, Anakin, Mara, and Mace Windu waited for them.

"You'd better stay on the ship," Kad told his erstwhile clan. "Let us explain things first."

Vau peered out the viewport. "That's Kenobi and Skywalker. Are they the 'Obi and Ani' you keep talking about?" He whistled in mock appreciation at Kad's nod. "Kal, your grandson's got friends in high places. We now have connections. It's easy living for us from here on out."

The Triumvirate came down the gangway only to be ambushed by Anakin. He crossed the space between them in a flash and glowered down at them.

Leia raised her chin. "We're back," she informed him calmly.

"I can see that," he answered through clenched teeth, barely able to keep from blowing up at them. "Where have you been _this_ time?"

"Have you ever heard of Voteb? It's a world in the far Outer Rim. We did a jailbreak."

Anakin's mouth dropped open. "Oh dear," Obi-Wan murmured. Mara's eyes widened.

Anakin dropped to one knee and gathered them all in a tight hug. "Don't you ever scare me like that again. Kad, did you know Vokara's tracking you down?"

"I know," he answered miserably.

"_Who_ did you break out of jail exactly, and why?" Master Windu interposed himself on the conversation with grim resignation.

"Mird's owner," Luke said. "Walon Vau. He was arrested by Sidious's black ops. And three others." They received four disbelieving stares.

"Ani," Kad broke the silence. "One of them's my grandfather." Anakin and Obi-Wan shared a shocked glance.

"They need a healer. It was terrible there."

"Right," Anakin said, all business. "I'll get them there, then. Can they walk?" He headed on board the ship.

Obi-Wan took his comlink off his belt and dialed Master Che. Kad could just barely make out her tinny voice. _"What?" _

"Vokara, where are you?"

Luke approached Obi-Wan like a dog that had done wrong. The Master frowned at him sternly, but turned his attention back to his comlink as Master Che answered.

"_A backwater dump called Voteb. I've lost the trail."_ She sounded decidedly vexed.

Wisely Obi-Wan held the com several centimeters from his face. "They're back."

The Twi'lek healer's response consisted of a spirited litany of multicultural curses, some of them colorful enough to make a Trandoshan blush. _"Do me a favor, Obi-Wan," _she growled. _"Keep that imp exactly where he is so I can kill him myself." _A crunch like someone had punched a button too hard ended the call.

Obi-Wan looked coolly at Luke, Leia, and Kad. "There will be massive repercussions over this. Still-" He looked vaguely pained at his admission. "-I admire the initiative."

Anakin appeared on the gangway with a rather disgruntled Kal Skirata in his arms. The old Mandalorian had an arm looped around the Jedi's neck to make the task easier, but complained in a raised voice, "I'm not an invalid, you know."

"You are from what I can sense," Anakin shot back. The other three followed with stumbling slowness.

Everyone present fell into line behind them and began the long trek to the Healing Halls. The Triumvirate drifted over to join Mara at the back of the parade. "How's it been here?" Kad asked.

To his surprise, Mara took a large step back to put distance between them. "You left me behind," she accused hotly. "You went and did a jailbreak while I was back here with Anakin freaking out and Master Obi-Wan watching me like a hawk-bat. They made me the strill sitter. Thanks for nothing."

"Sorry." Leia had the grace to look faintly sheepish in the face of Mara's blatant hostility, though she was still brazen enough to throw in an ironic flourish. "It just didn't occur to us to invite you on our crime spree."

Mara was unimpressed by the pseudo-apology. "And here I thought we were _friends_," she hissed, dripping acidic betrayal. She whirled on her heel and stomped after the Masters.

Guilt pricked both the boys, and even Leia. "I didn't know that," she muttered as they trailed along behind, in the depths of disgrace.

* * *

><p>Anakin's mind raced in confused circles, but he had enough subtlety now to hide that behind a personable demeanor. "So you're Kal Skir'ta?" he asked the small, fragile man he carried.<p>

The Mandalorian clicked his back teeth together once in annoyance. "It's Skirata, actually. And you're Skywalker. What are they going to do to us here exactly?"

"Help you get better. Don't worry. It's actually a very soothing process."

The taller man, no less old and just as worn, peered around, obviously searching. "Where's Mird?"

"I think Mara left it in the garden. Let's get you situated in the Healing Halls first."

They arrived at that destination in short order. Master Caudle was astounded and rather alarmed by the influx of cranky Mandalorian patients, but quickly made the necessary arrangements. A lounge was set aside for Clan Skirata's use, and, as per their request, they were given four small cells on the same hall.

Kal limped over to the window once Anakin put him down and, after fiddling with the controls, opened it wide. A warm breeze gusted through the opening with all the vigor of their height above the ground. Kal closed his eyes to savor the fresh air. Anakin noted the whiteness of his skin and the swollen joints.

"Thank you," Kal said without turning.

"For what?" he asked, confused.

The Mandalorian continued to soak in the sun's warmth. He spoke evenly and matter-of-factly. "Taking care of the army after the war. I always thought you were hypocrites, and maybe you still are. Still, taking care of the powerless is what you're all about, right? So at least that one time, you lived up to your ideals. If nothing else, it gives me pause and a chance to consider that I may be wrong."

Anakin tried in vain to think of a response. Master Caudle saved him the trouble by appearing to whisk Kal, along with the others, into the lounge for an exam.

"What were the conditions of this place?" he inquired as he gently loosened prematurely arthritic limbs and massaged wasted muscles. The clearly defined V between his eyebrows folded into its height of prominence; he already suspected much, and didn't like it.

Vau provided a clipped summary while he stared holes in the closed door. "The cells were about 1.5 meters all around. For those of us with normal proportions-" He shot Kal a look, to which the other man responded with an eye roll. "-there wasn't enough room to stand or stretch out straight. There were no mattresses or anything, just rough rock. They never let us out of our cells."

"Never?" exclaimed Anakin in dismay.

Vau shook his head shortly. "Not once. We had a bucket for a toilet, and a bowl for water and for whatever gruel they fed us. They changed the bucket when we were drugged-something in the food; it tasted a little sour-every other day, if they remembered, and fed us that same day. If they remembered. The guards never spoke to us, and the other cells were too far away for any communication. No medical treatment, obviously." Anakin's head swam at the idea of eleven years of that sort of isolation. _I would go crazy._ Even though none of the escapees where insane, a hollowness sat at the heart of each of them, a gnawing ache that only time and uncompromising love could ease. If anything could.

He caught Obi-Wan's hand for reassurance, and felt his former Master's shock and horror through the reflexive tightening of his fingers. "We'll have this prison eradicated immediately," he said to Anakin with barely veiled fervency. "I don't care who's there or what they did."

"No one deserves that," Anakin agreed with a shudder.

Caudle darkened visibly. "In that case, you will require extensive therapy. The fact is, there's little wrong with you that traditional healing can treat. I sense no recent injuries, no diseases or infections. You're simply victims of appalling neglect."

Before anyone could say anything else, the sound of claws scrambling madly on the marble floors and shouts of surprise echoed down the hall. Vau sat up as quickly as if he had been shocked by an electric socket. "Mird?" he called hopefully.

A keening howl of joy answered him. Anakin opened the door with a Force push and jumped out of the path of danger. Mird shot down the hall toward them. Its jowls were dragged back by the speed of its advance, transforming its face into a wild grin.

Tears streamed down Vau's truly radiant face. "Here I am, _Mird'ika_!" he cried. "Come here, baby!"

It launched itself into his open arms. He collapsed back onto the couch, laughing as it licked frantically at his tears, grumbling and squeaking like it was telling him everything it had ever left unsaid. Drool soaked the front of Vau's new healer-issued white dressing gown, but he actually seemed to welcome it. Everyone watching was torn between a smile at the contagious joy of their reunion and an expression of disgust at the un-cleanliness of the whole business.

No one noticed Ferris until he was beside Vau's couch. The older man jerked with surprise, hand flying to his waist in search of a knife he didn't have. Master Caudle dove forward and barely kept him from falling the couch by seizing his forearm and heaving him back on.

Ferris sighed in sorrowful resignation. "I did try to warn you." He held out Verp, who whimpered in fear and trembled bonelessly in his hands. The four Mandalorians' eyes fell upon it. They stared in bafflement. "What is that?" Laseema asked, her tone suggesting wasn't sure if she should hug it or run screaming from the room.

Vau reached out an incredulous hand but stopped short of touching the little strill's fluffy head. "_Mird'ika_…" he said suspiciously. Mird squeaked encouragingly at its frightened baby, which confirmed Vau's worst suspicions. He drew his head back in indignant consternation. "You went and had a baby without me?"

Kal burst into the racking guffaws of one who hasn't really laughed in a long time. "Well I'll be! You're jealous, Walon! Who of? The baby or the father?" At the mention of Mird's old flame, a decidedly sour look crossed Vau's face. Kal fell into paroxysms of laughter. "You are! You're jealous of a strill!" Laseema and Besany began to giggle. The three of them laughed until their ribs ached, which didn't take long. The Jedi stood by, smiling and indulging in a few chuckles of their own. At last, when Clan Skirata lay limply on their couches, wiping at watery eyes, Ferris set the baby on the ground, where it shrank in on itself and quivered.

"It's Verp," he informed them.

Kal peered up at him. "And you are?"

"Ferris Olin. I'm Leia's Master."

Kal studied his silver-striped hair, amber eyes, and pointed teeth. "What are you exactly?"

"A Firrerreo."

"What's that? I've never heard of it."

Ferris crossed the room and sat down on a comfortable chair by the door. He dropped his chin into his hands with a mournful sigh. "Neither have I."

Kal opened his mouth to ask, thought better of it, and closed it again. Verp punctuated the encounter with a shrill yelp as Vau reached a hand toward it. He froze, frowning. Mird watched its baby with concern from its position draped sideways across Vau's lap. It grumbled and looked pleadingly up at Vau. Verp inched its way backwards across the floor toward the dubious safety of Anakin's feet, where it huddled beneath his over-robe. The silence spoke volumes.

"That's the most insecure animal I've ever seen," Kal observed at last, and that about said it all.

* * *

><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	12. Chapter 12 You Again

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 12: You Again<p>

Once all the fuss was over, Vau stretched out on the couch he and Mird had claimed as their own, ready for a good long nap. It wasn't a luxurious couch by the standards of his snooty highborn father, certainly. No velvet covering, no gold trim, cushions that were not in fact overstuffed to the point of bursting. To his mind, however, it was a very nice couch, and worth laying claim to.

Mird concurred, as it stretched itself out longways beside him with a sleepy gurgle. He couldn't stop staring at it. It had haunted his dreams for what had been an eternity of empty moments back in his miserable hole on Alcatraz. In his head it was always hunting, that eerie howl bugled from its throat as it chased down its prey, set for a bloody feast. He supposed, if you wanted to get psychological about it, he had been reassuring himself that it was strong and capable. It could have escaped from that doomed apartment. It could have survived on its own, whether in the slums of Coruscant or on some other planet, if it ever happened to stow away. Now, it seemed, it had. He stroked a hand along its crumpled back fur. "Clever Mird," he muttered to it. "_Mirdala_, _Mird'ika_. You got away, and now you've found me again. Clever, clever baby." It rumbled in its sleep. Vau found he actually had tears in his eyes. He quickly turned his head to face the couch before Kal saw them. _I'm going sentimental in my advanced old age_, he thought with benevolence that surprised even him.

He decided he felt well enough for some friendly mockery. He levered himself into an upright position and cast his eyes for the perfect target, namely Kal. The other man had picked an armchair, of course, with a stool that he could prop his good leg on with while his other jutted out at its awkward angle. "Really, Kal," he snorted with the height of disdain.

Kal immediately was on the alert. "What?"

Vau nodded at his leg. "You go and get that old ankle problem fixed, and then not three weeks later, you break your knee getting arrested. I had no idea you were so accident prone."

The accusation actually got to Kal a bit, who struggled into a more straight-backed position in his chair. "I am not, you ingrate."

"You're right, you're not," Vau acquiesced at his most gracious, which brought a wary scowl to Kal's face. "I had no idea you were so delicate."

Kal started to his feet when the door burst open. A muscular human male in the robes of a Jedi stumbled to a halt in the doorway. A swift look took in the occupants of the room. His eyes widened. "Kal Skirata?" he asked, shocked.

Kal dropped back into his chair. "Zey?" The two former colleagues stared at one another. Vau waited for the fireworks that were sure to erupt. After all, Kal had always thought Zey's decisions were stupid and short-sighted, but that was on principle. His old principle of "Jedi equals bad." Vau didn't know what to make of this new "Jedi equals okay after all" philosophy. He wasn't too fond of it, admittedly.

"I heard about you…being in prison," Zey said carefully. He looked left and right before settling on the edge of a chair. "I'm sorry about your sons."

"We're going to find them," Kal said staunchly.

Vau actually felt sorry for the guy. He was too sentimental, and had such a one-track mind. For years it had been nothing but Nulls, Nulls, Nulls, and the commandos. Vau really was surprised Kal hadn't gone insane at Alcatraz with his overactive imagination and his Force-damned sense of guilt whirled together in a constant nauseating spiral.

"Your Council's agreed to help," Kal pressed, leaning forward. "Kenobi did, anyway, and Skywalker pretty much pledged himself to the cause. That's two effective Jedi right there."

Zey looked thoughtful. He seemed to understand that Kal offered him a position on the Save-the-Skirata-Boys committee. "What happened exactly?"

Kal assumed a blank-faced expression as he did his best to put distance between himself and the topic. "We were all arrested in the middle of the night. Your Jedi took _Kad'ika_." He stopped, then shot the question at Zey. "Did you know?" Reluctant, grudging hurt infused his voice.

Zey winced visibly. Vau reflected that he wouldn't be Force-sensitive for all the credits in the galaxy, if you could feel everyone's physical and mental pain like you were plugged into their nerve-endings and hormones. His own pain was something he could use. He had used it, in fact, to keep himself sane during the years at Alcatraz. If he was intent on the aches in his muscles or the pounding in his head, the emotional pain stayed away.

"I first saw him when he was small, maybe two or three," Zey admitted. He relaxed enough to lean back against the chair and study the ceiling. "He felt so much like Etain…looked like her too, in the face."

Kal nodded. Vau tried in vain to imagine the tiny baby he had known as a sinewy three-year-old. All that popped into his head was the commandos at that physical age. Somehow he doubted they were much like Kad _Skir'ta_ had become.

"I remembered how she and your sons were close…but I knew there was no way you would let any grandchild of yours become a Jedi. Black hair and brown eyes are common for humans, and even if he was related to Etain, he could be a cousin or brother or nephew, not a son. So I decided I was over thinking it." Zey blinked and looked at Kal with regret plain on his face. "I wish I hadn't."

"It was Darman," Kal supplied to fill the expanding silence. "Darman's his father."

Zey lapsed into thought. "Was Bardan arrested with you and the others?"

Kal nodded shortly. "He fought the Jedi who came with the black ops."

Zey considered his interlocked fingers. "Well, Bardan and I were never as close as some Masters and Padawans can be."

Vau glanced at Kal, who apparently decided finding his sons was more important than lecturing a wrongheaded _jetii_ and kept his mouth shut.

Zey looked up at last. "But he was my Padawan. There's still a connection there. If I concentrated-really concentrated in deep meditation for extended periods-I could, possibly, pinpoint his location."

Kal caught his breath. "You could?"

"Well, he's not dead, that much I can tell you right now. I would have felt it if he was dead."

Kal sprang to his feet with the speed of a man half his age. "What are you waiting for? Go! Concentrate!"

"All right, all right," Zey said as he headed for the door, only to be nearly run down by Master Caudle.

The scruffy human healer caught Kal just before his bad leg gave out and pushed him back into his chair. "Mister Skirata," he hissed, "I told you not to agitate yourself until Vokara returns from Voteb. You are currently most agitated, and I will not stand for it. Sit."

Kal looked up at him, unrepentant. "There's a chance I might find my sons, and you want me to sit still?"

Caudle crossed his mottled arms across his chest. "Yes."

Kal blew out a lungful of air. "Obviously you're not a parent."

"I'm not, but I trained three Padawans to Knighthood and have recently taken a fourth, thank you."

Kal was unimpressed. "Once you've handled six emotionally disturbed and exceptionally gifted Nulls and one hundred four commandos, then we'll talk."

Caudle in his turn remained unimpressed. "This can go on, Mister Skirata. We can argue for hours over who's had more responsibility, over who's suffered more, over who makes better pancakes. I don't care if you raised and trained the Army of Light single-handedly. You are my patient until Vokara returns, and I will not tolerate any rash antics. What would your sons think if I return you to them in worse shape than you already are?"

Kal sank back into his chair, resigned and annoyed. "Fine."

Vau settled down for a nap, but found himself wondering how in the blazes he ever ended up sitting peaceably in a lounge with the remnants of Clan Skirata as _part_ of Clan Skirata. He and Kal had hated one another for years when they both trained clones back on Kamino. No matter how many times he ran the three years of the war through his head, he couldn't pinpoint any particular time when he stopped working reluctantly with the clan and joined it. Still, it had happened.

He was actually proud to be one of these people, and had looked forward to going home to their secluded base of Kyrimorut when they deserted. That anticipation had made the arrest all the worse, of course. For once in his life he was content, eager to be headed somewhere with people he actually felt something for-and that happiness was crushed mere hours before it was realized.

Hate rose in his stomach at the memory of that golden lightsaber slashing toward his face. And the thought of those hands reaching out to pick up _Kad'ika_ and turn him into a _dar'manda jetii _with a benevolent smile and a mouthful of lies- Kal might have suddenly changed into a Jedi-lover, but if that scum ever showed his face to Vau he would lose it. And Mird would lick up the blood.

_Dar'manda. Darman. This will kill that boy._

_Dar'manda_: a Mandalorian who has lost their sense of identity and culture, and hence their soul. There was still redemption for Kad, Vau reasoned with his eyes closed and Mird's heavy head on his chest. If he returned to Mandalore with them, then all that would be solved.

Mandalore. It had been so long. He tried to bring a picture of the fortress-like Kyrimorut to mind. Hopefully Fi had kept the place in good condition…

He sat up abruptly. "Kal, we forgot about Fi."

Kal turned even paler. "_Shab_." He looked around wildly. "Has anyone got a comlink?"

Besany eased herself to a standing position and made her stiff way to the door. A few minutes later, an apprentice healer arrived with spare comlinks for all.

Kal stared at his like he'd never seen anything so precious or so dangerous. "You'd better not have changed your number, _F'ika_," he muttered as he entered Fi's contact number with a shaking finger. The com beeped. The four waited in thick silence.

Someone on the other end picked up. "Hello? Skirata here." The voice was roughened by wind and age, but it was most definitely Fi.

Kal closed his eyes as he fought to keep a sob of relief from bursting from him.

"Is anyone there?"

"Hey son," Kal said softly. No sound but the hiss of interstellar static. "You still there, son? Fi?"

"_Buir_?" Breathless disbelief.

"It's me, son."

"Really? Is it really you?"

Kal smiled at Laseema, who had two hands pressed to her mouth, overcome with emotion as the sound of a voice so like her husband's, and yet so different. "It's really me, _F'ika._"

Another protracted silence. Then the dam burst. "_Buir!_ Where are you? What h-h-happened?" Shallow, panicked breaths dangerously close to hyperventilating rattled from the com.

Kal regarded it with concern. "Take a deep breath, son. You're going to faint."

"Where are you? Answer the question!"

"The Jedi Temple. It's a long story." Kal hurried on before Fi could launch into a hysterical rant. "I'll tell you all about it, son, but first I want to hear about you. Are you still at Kyrimorut?"

"Yeah, _Buir_. I am." Fi's voice trembled. "You have a granddaughter, _Buir_."

Kal lit up. "I do?"

"Warrez. She's five. Feistiest little thing you ever saw. Great with a knife especially, just goes right for the vital arteries. It's a beautiful thing, that instinct of hers. It's just Parja, Warrez, and me here. I'm coming. I'm coming right now. Stay exactly where you are and- Ouch!" Something heavy thumped. "I'm okay! But I am coming. Don't move a muscle, don't you dare. Parja! I've gotta go to Coruscant!" He exchanged rapid-fire dialogue with a female Vau knew to be his wife, Parja. After a brief shouting match, Fi spoke into the comlink again. From the muffled sound, he had it clipped to something, the neckline of his overalls maybe, as he raced about in preparation for his sudden departure. "She and Warrez are staying here. Too slow to bring them. If I go alone, I can take the _Tracyn_. It's a new breed of ship, Predator-class, I think. Really sleek and quick. Are you there, _Buir_?"

"Right here," Kal soothed quickly. He and Fi kept a running conversation that stopped occasionally as Fi bundled something particularly unwieldy into the _Tracyn_'s small storage space. Kal refused to fill him in until he was in hyperspace. Fi brought the _Tracyn _to its limits, Vau was sure, to jet out of the atmosphere and into hyperspace so he could hear what had happened to his long lost family.

When the soft concussion of the jump faded to the stillness of light speed travel, Fi asked, "Well?" Fear was evident in his voice.

Kal filled him in as gently as he could on the arrest, Alcatraz, and his brothers' continued MIA status. "And Fi?"

"Yes?"

Kal glanced at Laseema. "_Kad'ika_'s here."

Fi breathed out a sigh. "That's good, at least. Wait. They put a baby in prison?"

"No. He's a Jedi, _ad'ika_."

Silence, then an explosive, agonized, "Fierfek!"

"It's okay, son."

"No, _Buir_, it's not!" Fi exclaimed, emotionally overwrought. "I looked for you all everywhere! Prisons, hospitals, asylums! I looked for him on every orphan register I could get my hands on! And he was at the Jedi Temple the whole time! Stupid, stupid! That's where they would take a Force-sensitive kid, and I didn't think of it. And I never found him! I never found any of you! I'm so sorry!" Fi's voice rose to a howl. Then it broke. "I'm so sorry, _Buir_," he sobbed.

Kal pressed the com to his heart. He held it there for a minute as he fought to keep his own composure. Vau outwardly remained unmoved, but part of him ached along with his clanmates.

"Fi Skirata, listen to me," Kal said steadily into the com. "This is not your fault. You know you can't control all the variables. How many times did I tell you that in training?"

Ragged breathing on the other end.

"How many?" Kal insisted, tender but no-nonsense.

"More than I can count, Sarge." Fi dragged the words out, strangely relieved at the reminder of their old relationship. Well, it was a firm foundation to stand up when the world seemed to be falling to pieces around him.

"We lost that time, son. There's no other way to put it. We were careless and we lost. It was a failure on our part, not yours. But you know what? _Ba'slan shev'la._ Strategic disappearance. Yeah, being in prison is a far cry from vanishing on purpose, but the ultimate result is the same. We're back now. We'll find your brothers, and we'll come home to you, son. I promise you that."

"I love you, _Buir_."

Kal held the com against his bowed forehead, as close as he could get now to resting Fi's head against his own. Vau had no idea how or why, but the image bloomed in his mind of Fi mirroring the gesture on his lonely ship out in space: com to forehead, eyes closed as he listened to the sound of his father breathe. Somehow he knew that was exactly what Fi was doing.

"_Ni kar'tayl gar darasuum, ad'ika_," Kal whispered in return, each word a lingering touch. Vau averted his eyes, embarrassed to be witness to such an intimate moment.

"I'll be right there," Fi promised passionately. "Stay there, don't move, tell the _jetiise_ I'll flay their sorry hides-"

"Son," Kal interposed sternly, "the Jedi are friends now. They raised Kad _and_ saved us from Alcatraz _and_ took care of you all, if I'm not mistaken. You did take the aging treatment, didn't you?"

Fi was silent for a beat. "If you say so, _Buir_." His voice hinted that he questioned the condition of Kal's head. "Yeah, I did. I'm twenty-four, and look all of thirty-eight. A real charmer. I'm coming. Don't move."

Kal leaned back against his chair, able at last to let go just a little. "Don't worry, son. I'm still here."

* * *

><p><strong>Please review. Question: what do you think of Kal's change of heart regarding Jedi? If you're confused over that, or any other point in the story, I'll explain at the beginning of the next chapter.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	13. Chapter 13 Waiting

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 13: Waiting<p>

Master Che struggled in vain to keep from seething as she entered the access code into the pad outside the Temple's main gate to gain admittance to the complex. Obi-Wan had filled her in at length about her wayward Padawan's escapades. Part of her marveled at the audacity of it. Another, much larger, part vowed a reckoning so severe it would set that boy's head spinning for the next decade. Her head full of interesting punishments like having to perform floating meditation while in a handstand-palms half a meter off the ground at least-she failed to notice the figure crouched in the shadows of one of the great bronzium statues that guarded the expansive promenade. At last the stubborn security system deigned to accept her code-finicky thing. The imposing doors slid slowly open just enough to allow a lone figure entrance.

Master Che stepped forward just as the being behind the statue charged. The echoing thud of metal boots on duracrete alerted her. She spun, only to collide with the rampaging man. He seized her wrists with gauntleted hands and tried to twist them up away from her belt. Sun flashed off red and gray painted armor. An attempted invasion by a one-man army? Not a chance. Master Che wrenched one hand free with Force assistance-stang, he was strong-and snatched her lightsaber from her belt. This armor she recognized: Mandalorian. Her blade couldn't harm it. Fair enough.

The man tried to shove her aside so he could make it through the door. She braced herself and shoved back with the Force hard enough to throw his weight off her. Then, flipping her lightsaber hilt in her hand, she brought it down on the crown of his helmet with a resounding _crack_. He jerked back, more surprised than dazed. She struck again, lightning-quick. _Crack, crack, __**crack**__._ The Mandalorian sprang out of range. She positioned herself between him and the doorway, just daring him to try that again.

He fumbled with his helmet and pulled it off. He was an outdoorsman, judging by the deeply tanned skin. His hair was close-cropped, black with graying sideburns. It was much older than when she'd last seen it in person, but she knew that face.

"You're a Fett clone," she surmised coolly.

He peered into his helmet. "You messed up my HUD," he growled indignantly.

"You attacked me."

"You're in my way."

The verbal sparring match halted for an instant as they studied one another.

"You tried to break into my home," Master Che continued pointedly. The clone raised his chin, prepared to do battle. "My father's in there. I haven't seen him in eleven years, and nothing you say or do is going to stop me."

Master Che was unmoved. "You charged me, tried to force your way into a private residence of meditation and reflection, and now you accuse me of holding your father hostage? If you're trying to get me to let you in, it's not working."

The clone glowered, but sighed. He rubbed the back of his neck. "Look, my father's a patient in there. So's the rest of my clan. I've been here almost three hours and no one's let me in to see them. I _need_ to see them." Desperation threaded his voice. Her lekku twitched in unintended sympathy. He truly wanted to see whatever family he had inside. Still, she couldn't just let the assault pass.

"Did you try knocking?" she asked dryly.

He started to nod, then stopped, thought, and slapped a hand to his head. "Okay, fine. I was in too much of a hurry for that. I did kick the door a few times, though."

"And yelled obscenities and inventive threats, no doubt. I'm sure 'Jedi scum' came up a few times." His half-embarrassed, half-impenitent silence confirmed her theory. She crossed her arms, still in the doorway. "Well, it's no wonder they didn't let you in. How would you like it if a stranger whose culture has a prevalent history of anti-Mandalorian bias tried to kick in your front door and called you a knuckle-dragging savage?"

The clone held up his hands placatingly. "You're right. I didn't think. I'm a friend, see?" He pulled his blaster out of its holster and slid it across the ground to her feet.

She picked it up and examined it. It was very well cared for. "I wouldn't be so annoyed if you hadn't grabbed my wrists to keep me from my lightsaber. That's a very threatening move."

The clone crossed his arms across his chest plate. "You were reaching for it. My reaction was the result of years of training. Self-preservation was drilled into me like a screw through durasteel, and you're going to blame me for that?"

"You rushed me," she repeated.

He threw up his hands. "I was just trying to get in! I wouldn't have actually hurt you."

She turned the blaster over in her fingers, noted the gray-trimmed red design that matched his armor. "What's your name?"

"Fi Skirata, sir. I mean- Vape it. It's just hard to get out of the old rhythms, you know?"

Skirata. She tossed the blaster back to him. He caught it, surprised. Master Che stepped aside and gestured. "After you."

Fi was suspicious, but the way was open, so he bolted forward and through it before she or some other crazy Jedi could change their minds and close it again. She followed at a more stately pace through the broad outer courtyard into the entry hall.

Fi stared around the grand front hall, mouth agape at the sight of the vaulted ceiling and long marble walkway, the massive pillars and levels of balconies. Statues of Jedi long dead stood sentinel with serene bronzium faces. Living Jedi in sweeping over-robes paced the hall in the distance, or moved about on the balconies two or three stories above. It was quiet, like a cathedral. Peaceful. The scope of the building, the tranquility in the air, the history it all represented, invoked an almost religious awe in his clone's heart. He lifted his feet to check his boots' soles, suddenly ridiculously worried he might track mud in on this spotless dull gold and dove gray marble floor. _This place is not sacred to me_, he chastised himself. _I am _Mando'ad_. I feel no awe toward Jedi._ He knew, though, that somewhere inside his earliest conditioning still responded to the Temple as the home of the closest thing to gods the galaxy had.

But he didn't have to be happy about it.

Master Che continued down the hall. He broke into a quick trot to catch up, suddenly unwilling to be left alone. "Do you know where the patients are kept?"

She smiled blandly. "I should hope so. I'm the Master Healer."

Fi did his best to walk confidently and at the Jedi's side, not slightly behind like a subordinate soldier. The magnificence of this opening hall amazed him. _Forget Temple. This place is a palace._

"Tell you what." He looked at the Twi'lek Jedi, who raised her eyebrows. "I'll show you to the Healing Halls, then go find my Padawan." They continued down the palatial hall, turned a corner into a broad columned walkway dotted with windows. "You got a Padawan?" Fi asked as they made their slow way toward his family, more out of politeness than curiosity.

She nodded. "Kad Skir'ta." She frowned. "Now that I think about it, he must be your nephew, if Kal Skirata is your father."

Fi stopped and gaped for the second time in as many minutes. He had attacked this woman not five minutes ago. And now he learned she might as well be _Kad'ika_'s mother. "Oh, _shab_," he moaned. "I am just not good at this."

* * *

><p>Days passed.<p>

Fi camped out in the Skirata lounge, refusing all invitations to be put up in a nearby hotel or even a room in the Temple. He stayed as close to his father as possible, leaving only when the healers drove him away or Kal himself ordered him off.

The Triumvirate barely saw the resident Mandalorians, as their Masters kept them busy with hours of meditation, a series of lectures with Masters as eminent as Yoda himself, and (Obi-Wan's idea) scrubbing down every single 'fresher in the Temple which, as it was built to house ten thousand beings, was no small feat.

Zey secluded himself in the meditation chambers with the healing crystals of fire and lapsed into such a deep meditation that he had to be eased out by another in order to eat.

Master Che, meanwhile, began a healing regimen for Clan Skirata that might as well have been a crusade for how grimly she tackled it. They were fed on light but nourishing broths, then soups, then stews. Carefully planned periods of excruciating physical therapy alternated with times of rest. Even during the periods of rest, though, the clan worried about their lost ones.

At times, Anakin found it difficult to be near them. Their sorrow and worry blared through the Force, not restrained at all, almost deliberately amplified, though they weren't trying to broadcast. Wild emotions were the Mandalorian way, he supposed, and remembered the unleashed grief of Kad when he first arrived, strong enough to elicit a physical reaction from sensitive Jedi. And Anakin was emotionally responsive. Once, when he had gone to their lounge to talk, the combined anguish was so strong he had wretched into a basin in the nearby 'freshers, barely able to keep himself from sobbing. The change in him this signified hurt, really. He used to be all right around normal beings, not needing to resort to the arms-length distance many Jedi used to keep from being overwhelmed by the sorrows of the galaxy. Was he really such a Jedi that any feelings not balanced by a light side-fed serenity made him want to vomit?

So it was that he sought out Clan Skirata in the gardens close to a week after Fi's arrival. The four invalids rested in a secluded corner of one of the rooftop meditation gardens. A clear pond, home to a lively collection of shimmering fish, rippled nearby, while a large tree cast a cool shadow over the bright green grass.

Laseema stared around as if she had never seen any place so beautiful. When she saw Anakin coming toward them down one of the stone paths, her wide-eyed appreciation hardened into bitter resentment. She had disliked the Jedi ever since she was rescued, but Master Che's return made the situation much worse. One look at the Master Healer and she concluded that this other blue-skinned Twi'lek had replaced her as the mother figure in Kad's life. Unfortunately, that was at least partly true. Besany sat at the pond's edge, feet in the water, the fish nibbling at her toes. Vau leaned against the tree trunk, obviously perfectly willing to retire immediately to a life of leisure and never exert himself again. Kal lay sprawled in the sun, asleep.

Anakin nodded a greeting. "Hello. How are you doing?"

"Okay," Vau said shortly, in typical Vau fashion, so Anakin was not offended. "As well as can be expected. I haven't felt this decrepit since-ever."

Anakin selected a rock at the pond's edge to settle cross-legged upon. His attention was drawn to Mird, who squeaked cajolingly at its distressed offspring. Verp lurked behind a bush a few meters from Vau. It peered out at him, shaking visibly, whining pitifully. The newcomers struck terror into its heart. Life in the Lower Levels, where strangers were either danger or dinner and it was Mird's only darling, had not adequately prepared it for momentous changes. Coming to the Temple made it agitated. Clan Skirata's arrival terrified it.

Vau watched it from the corner of his eye.

"Can't you blow on its face or something and get it to like you?" Anakin asked. "Obi-Wan did that when it first came here, and it's liked all of us ever since."

"That's something parent strills do to reassure their babies. They have scent glands in the roof of their mouths, see." Vau opened his own and pointed to the hollows above the tongue. "They breathe the scent into the baby's nostrils, and from then on they're known, they're friends. Babies accept the introduction from one member of a pack as representative. Your Obi-Wan made all _jetiise_ okay with it."

"Well, why don't you make all of you okay with it?" asked Anakin, perplexed. Verp's terror quickly exhausted all patience.

"I would if I could catch it." Vau pointed a skeletal hand at him. "You could bring it to me. It trusts you."

Anakin was reluctant to take part in what was sure to be perceived as a betrayal, but he coaxed the baby over with high-voiced urging. "Come here, Verp. Good baby."

It squealed and dashed across the open space to tremble in his lap. It was not scared enough not to sniff hopefully at his fingers for a scent of roba sausage, however. He carried it over to Vau. The old mercenary reached up to take it. It froze as it stared down into his gaunt face. He blew a mouthful of air onto its nose. It blinked, then began to wiggle. A friendly whine rose in its throat.

Vau smiled in satisfaction. "Now then," he said, taking the strill and holding it up at eyelevel. "Don't worry, _Ver'ika_, we're all _Mando'ade_ here." "Speak for yourself," Anakin retorted genially as he returned to his rock. His eyes drifted over to Kal, asleep in the sun. The others were at least partially shaded by the tree. Such direct exposure to afternoon sunlight couldn't be good for his ashen skin.

Vau followed his gaze. "Got any sunscreen, Skywalker? Otherwise, we'd better wake him up and move him."

Kal's Force rhythms, however, indicated a truly restful sleep without dreams. So Anakin peeled off his over-robe and draped it over the small man from head to toe. "There," he said. "Now he won't burn."

Vau snorted unappreciatively. "It looks like a funeral shroud."

Besany pulled her feet out of the pond and inched along until she sat next to Anakin's rock. "So how's Kad?" she asked brightly.

Anakin sensed the wistfulness behind the question. She was thinking not of her nephew, he realized, but of her husband and the children they had never had. "Scrubbing down one of the 'freshers with Luke and Leia at the moment."

She stuck her feet back in the water and swirled it until a burnt orange fish flitted over to investigate her toes. "Tell us about him."

Secondhand pain struck Anakin at the idea of asking a stranger to tell him about a member of his own family. He searched for the right words. Even Laseema looked away from the dancing water skeeters long enough to pay attention. "Kad is a peacemaker," he said at last. "He may not have much healing talent, but he embodies a healer's basic instinct: the need to ease any hurt they feel. But he doesn't believe we can right every wrong. In that respect, he's more mature in his perception of the galaxy than most kids. He tries his best, and generally accepts his limits, but when he disappoints someone he loves, he blames himself. He's friendly with most of his peers, but only close to a few. Mostly he tries to avoid trouble, but when backed into a corner, you've never seen a fiercer fighter."

Vau nodded. "And I can tell you what's _jetii_ and what's Mando." He held up his fingers and ticked off points. "Peacemaker, Jedi. Self-blame, Jedi. Close to a few, Mando. Tries to avoid trouble, Jedi. Fierce fighter, Mando."

Anakin shook his head. "Self-blame isn't a Jedi trait."

Vau glared at him. "How do you explain it, then?"

Anakin shrugged helplessly. "It's just the result of the tragic things that happened to him. Our training didn't produce it any more than yours did."

Vau considered, then folded down one finger. He held up the remaining four. "You know the boy best. Two Jedi traits, two Mando. The question is, which wins out?"

It was then that it first occurred to Anakin that Kad might want to go with his clan when they left, that Kad might leave them.

_Suffocating blackness, stifled air, no light- Swamping panic-_

Kal woke with a strangled yell as he thrashed under Anakin's encompassing over-robe. Horrified, the Jedi ripped the dark cloth off of him. Kal's eyes were wide and hollow with fear. His trembling hands grabbed at Anakin's arm.

Anakin fell to his knees beside him. "Kal Skirata. It wasn't a dream," he said as clearly and calmly as he could, though his own heart thumped hard behind his ribs. "You were rescued. Vau, Laseema, Besany, Mird, Verp, and Kad are here."

Kal squeezed his arm with emaciated hands until the skin turned white. "My sons?" he wheezed.

"We'll find them," Anakin vowed. "Master Zey's meditating right now. It's only a matter of time."

"We just have to wait, Kal," Besany ventured as she moved to sit beside him. She draped a careful arm around his thin shoulders.

Kal struggled to sit up straight. He cast Anakin's over-robe a look, then laughed shakily. "We were robbed of eleven years, _ad'ika_. I spent every single day waiting. I don't know how much more I can take."

* * *

><p>Kad wished to never see another scrub brush as long as he lived. He, Leia, and Luke had spent hours of the past week scrubbing every 'fresher in the Jedi Temple until their fingers were rubbed raw. That was no excuse, however, as Master Che just whipped out her healing crystal, mended the skin, and imperiously ordered them to continue. They had just finished the very last one.<p>

Shower stalls lined one wall of the blue-tiled room, toilet cubicles another, sinks the side opposite the door. Jedi 'freshers were communal, used by both males and females and by all species. Kad had been quite surprised on his first mission off planet when he discovered it was considered bad taste in many cultures to see beings of the other gender naked. In that sense, being home was a relief. There were no awkward gender barriers or pointless nudity taboos hanging over his head.

Hethrew his brush into the bucket of water and stood, stretching his arms over his head. Luke and Leia also stretched slowly as they savored the knowledge that their drudgery was at an end.

As if summoned, Mara peered in. "You done?"

"Have you forgiven us?" Leia shot back.

The older girl tilted her head in consideration. "I suppose. At least I didn't have to have a conference with Master Windu. Ugh. Kal's been asking to see you, by the way, Kad."

Kad looked up. "All right. I'll go now."

He wished he'd had more opportunity to talk to his grandfather. Somehow, without being charismatic in the traditional sense, Kal had a magnetic personality, the sort that could bring together a group of random people and turn it into a team, even a family. Also, there was something else that Kad couldn't place, a familiarity that he could never quite pull into his conscious awareness. Something in him proclaimed with confidence, "I know this man," even as he shook his head in regretful denial.

"Great!" Mara exclaimed. "Let's go."

They had started for the door when one of the shower curtains was pulled aside. Kyp Durron emerged, grabbed the towel that hung on a hook outside the door, and started to dry off. "Hey!" Mara barked.

Kyp jumped and looked up with a nervous scowl. "I told you, Mara, I don't know what happened to your comlink. I didn't touch it, I swear."

Mara crossed the room and grabbed his arm. "Want to come?"

Kyp wrenched away and went about drying off. "Somewhere with you? No." Despite his bravado, he didn't quite make eye contact with her, instead focusing on the towel. Mara had recently hit her growth spurt, and was a good six centimeters taller than him. Mara smiled harmlessly, which only put Kyp even more on edge. He barely managed to pull on his tunic before Mara seized his arm and dragged him out the door. "Hey!" he yelled loudly and tried to pull away.

Mara nearly popped a pressure point on his arm, but Luke said, "Mara, don't!" forcefully enough to give her pause.

Kyp scowled at her, stormy-eyed and furious. He was always like this, belligerent and swaggering. He did have a circle of friends, though, who were not all bullies, either. Kad remembered how friendly Kyp had been after their duel. He wondered if maybe Kyp made friends the way most people made enemies. He only considered someone worthy of intimacy after they had beaten him soundly at something, and from then on viewed them as an equal and potential confidant. On the surface it didn't make sense, but the less Kad thought about it, the better he understood it. If someone defeated you, after all, they forced you to reveal your weaknesses. They'd seen you at your lowest, had stripped you of anything of which you could be proud. If they accepted you even then, it affirmed that you were indeed worth something. After all, if they'd seen you at your weakest, what more was there to hide? Mara wouldn't count because they had been at odds so long that the relationship was no longer clearly defined, and so no clean dividing line was possible. Kad, though, had defeated him in the Apprentice Tournament, so maybe-

"Hey, Kyp," he said.

Kyp glanced away from Mara. When he saw Kad, his expression cleared slightly. "I heard you were back. Did you really do a prison break, and is that small man really your grandfather?"

Kad nodded. "Yes. Would you like to come meet him? He's Mandalorian."

Kyp perked up, interest piqued. "Really? And he won't kill us?"

"No, doofus," Mara snorted. She released her grip on his arm, and the five continued down the hall at a civilized pace. "He's a reformed Mandalorian. He doesn't kill Jedi anymore. Apparently he actually likes us." Kad used his status as Master Che's apprentice to get them into the Healing Halls without being subjected to questioning over what was wrong, _exactly_.

When they got to Kal's healing cell, Kyp drew up short. "I don't know about this."

Mara snorted. "Don't be such a baby. He's nice. I've met him."

Kyp stared at the closed door for a minute, then his face hardened. "Okay," he said defiantly, and waved the door open.

Kad slipped in before him, eager to avert potential disaster. "Hi, Kal. _Babuir_," he amended with a little leap behind his ribcage.

Kal sat on the bed reading a holofile Obi-Wan had gotten from the Archives for him. He had had the thing three days, and was only on the fifteenth page, Kad saw. He looked up with a wide grin. "Hey, _Kad'ika_. And friends, too." He nodded to Luke, Leia, and Mara, and gave Kyp a curious look. His eyes quickly slid back to Kad, and once again took him in in his entirety, from the eyes he knew so well to the dangling braid that signaled his allegiance to a foreign ideal Kal had never believed in. Kad blinked in shock as Kal's reality crossed with his. He sank to the floor and sat cross-legged, fingering his braid.

Mara and Kyp remained standing. "This is Kyp Durron," she introduced. "He's a…friend of ours."

"Nice to meet you," Kal returned.

Kyp scrutinized him skeptically. "You don't look like a Mandalorian. You're not wearing armor."

Mara yanked on his Padawan braid hard enough to elicit a yelp. "Idiot. Sit down." Kyp glared balefully at her.

Kal smiled in exasperated amusement. "I knew it. You don't know a thing about Mandos, do you?"

Kyp shrugged eloquently. "I know how to fight them," he said with such dismissive simplicity that Kal laughed out loud. Kyp looked startled, but fortunately wasn't insulted.

Kal shook his head. "There's a lot more to Mandos then how to kill us, son."

"Like what?" Kyp prompted skeptically.

Kal swung his legs down so he perched on the edge of the bed. "Well, let's see. Why don't I teach you the six tenets of Mandalorian culture? Our kids grow up on them, and we live by them." The five kids scooted to from a semicircle at Kal's feet. He nodded and, watching them closely, recited in a rhythm that verged on singsong. "'Education and armor, self-defense, our tribe, our language, our leader-All help us survive.' That's the _Resol'nare_, or the Six Actions. All that's needed to be considered a Mandalorian is to follow those tenets." He eyed them. "Can you say it back?" They recited it without a stumble. Kal nodded in approval. "All right, why don't we have a basic course in Mando culture?"

He began to explain everything about that iconic warrior culture that they had never learned in classes. A marriage ceremony was four lines long, armor colors symbolized ideals or traits, adoption was as easy as saying "I know you as my child." The kids were quickly engrossed. Kal explained the Mandalorian beliefs with such a weight of certainty that they seemed not only a reasonable basis for life, but the obvious and essential one. "Then there's _Vode An_. It's a song." He closed his eyes and intoned,

"Glory!

One indomitable heart, Brothers all.

We, the wrath of Mandalore, Brothers all.

And glory, eternal glory,

We shall bear its weight together.

Forged like the saber in the fires of death, Brothers all.

One indomitable heart, Brothers all.

We, the wrath of Mandalore, Brothers all.

And…

Those who stand before us light the night sky in flame.

Our vengeance burns brighter still.

Every last traitorous soul shall kneel.

Those who stand before us light the night sky in flame.

Our vengeance burns brighter still.

Every last traitorous soul shall fall.

Forged like the saber in the fires of death, Brothers all!"

Even though Kal's voice was cracked with age and weariness, it grew heavy and strong as he chanted the binding song of the Mandalorians. The song was primitive, a pack's unifying cry, a challenging call to enemies, infectious and vibrant in the way an aak dog pack's howls stirred the deepest ingrained responses in a human's breast. Answering fire crawled through Kad's veins as he listened, enraptured.

Closing his eyes, he imagined hundreds of deep voices taking up the chant. His mental image expanded until he could see a stronghold on the ridge of a mountain, thick green jungle in the valley below. The city had been under siege for many days. And the Mandalorians arrived in a rainbow of armor, fanglike sabers in hand, formed their ranks outside the city gates, and began the ancient chant in its native _Mando'a_. They started out quiet and let the song swell of its own accord until it rumbled from mountain peek to mountain peak. And the city's inhabitants shrank inwardly as the mighty power of the chant crushed their defiance into numb dread.

Kal cut off the song off abruptly at a soaring high note.

"That was cool," Kyp burst out. The kids shared grins at the delight of hearing something new and exciting.

Kal smiled at them. His eyes flicked to Kad. "What did you think?" "It was amazing," Kad answered earnestly, with a grin.

Kal grinned widely in return. "Your uncle Mereel sang it to you whenever you had trouble sleeping, _Kad'ika_. In _Mando'a_, of course. You were a strange baby. You never tried to sing along. You just listened with this look of intensity, until you got too sleepy and drifted off, of course. I noticed your fingers tapping along at some parts. You remember the rhythm." Kad could have produced Kal's missing sons right there from under his over-robe for how happy that made him. Kad stared at his fingers. He hadn't been aware of tapping along. _Maybe I do remember something_, he thought with rising hope.

Mara winced suddenly. "Kriff it, Master Skywalker wants me," she said, making a face. "I have to go."

Kyp stood up. "This I have to see. See ya, Kad." Mara shoved him as they headed toward the door. Kyp dodged, Padawan braid bouncing.

"Kyp, you got a Master!" Kad exclaimed as he took in the change in hairstyle for the first time.

Kyp grinned and fingered his short dark brown braid. "Yep." "Congratulations!"

Kyp's radiated relieved pride. "It's about time. I was starting to think I was going to be in the Agri Corps. Apparently, Master Vos likes my resolve. Bye. I have to go see Mara get chewed out on not having patience or sensitivity again."

"He's one to talk!" Mara ranted as the door slid shut behind them. "Interesting, those two," Kal noted reflectively.

Kad sat still, hands clenching his knees as a leaden weight settled in his chest. Gone was the vicarious thrill of the _Vode An_ chant. Gone the carefree laughter with Kal. Gone the opportunity to forget who he was and what his life had been. Reality struck him on the head and left him wheeling.

Quinlan Vos was the Jedi who had stolen him.

* * *

><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	14. Chapter 14 Some Things Always Return

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 14: Some Things Always Return<p>

"I hate waiting," Anakin groused, well aware that his complaint was not in keeping with the proper conduct of a Jedi Master. _Proper conduct be blasted. I am just not meant to be patient. I've tried to learn it, but it's not coming._

Obi-Wan did not look up from behind his datapad. "There is no try," he said blandly in response to Anakin's testy irritation.

Anakin paced Obi-Wan's hexagonal Council member bedroom, past the desk and the sleeping pallet and the two meditation pads. Obi-Wan perched on one, engrossed in his latest venture into historical nonfiction. "You're just not old enough for that sort of esoteric wisdom to sound convincing, _Master_," Anakin snapped.

Obi-Wan did him the favor of placing the datapad on his lap and regarding him directly. "What personal store do you have in this exactly?" Anakin threw up his hands. "You ask that! You ask what personal store I have in finding the rest of Kad's family! I love you, Master, but I swear you can turn yourself to stone with the blink of an eye."

Obi-Wan's expression cooled. "You've accused me of that before, yes."

Anakin was immediately ashamed. _Here I am acting like we're back in the Clone Wars. Is this pre- or post-Sith, anyway?_ _Didn't I learn to listen to him, trust his judgment before my own, and above all, _never_ say anything to him that I might regret later? And I call Mara insensitive. Idiot, idiot, idiot!_

Mentally chided, he sank onto one of the other pads. "I'm sorry. I'm worried. You know I invest in people too quickly and too deeply." He made himself meet his former Master's eyes.

Obi-Wan put a hand on his shoulder. "You feel their pain, Anakin. You identify with it, you want to end it. That's nothing to be ashamed of. Your fatal flaw has always been your conviction that if you're good enough, you can save everyone. I know you learned that's not so eleven years ago, but a part of you still thinks it's true. Let go, Anakin. You're not omnipotent."

A sour taste filled Anakin's mouth. Padme once said something similar to him. He smiled wryly at Obi-Wan, but the expression twisted until it was almost a grimace. "I do let go, Master. Every day."

Obi-Wan opened his mouth to say more when the door slid open. Mace Windu, in all his focused intensity, stood behind it. "Zey located Jusik. He's in the Senate district."

They stared at him with undisguised skepticism. "Is this Jedi-turned-Mando posing as a Senate aide?" Anakin asked.

Windu frowned at him. "I don't know the details. All I know is that this is Council business. Obi-Wan, come with me. Anakin, stay here and tell Clan Skirata once we comm you."

Anakin jumped up as Obi-Wan followed Windu out the door and to the lift. "And why is this a Council matter?" he called after them, unhappy at being left out again but too conscious that Windu barely tolerated his existence to voice that fact.

"They were arrested on Sidious's orders. Any suffering they have endured is another atrocity we failed to prevent," Windu answered with a voice as cold as the night air of Tatooine. "We Jedi are servants of the Force. The Force is _life_. Therefore we serve all life, including Mandalorians." He gave Anakin a piercing glare. Someone had still not forgiven him for his near fall. "Jedi stand as shields before the dark so others won't have to. And we, the servants of life and light, fell for the dark's charisma just as quickly as anyone else. We served the living incarnation of the dark for three years. We were blind and foolish. Helping the dark in the name of the light." The deep disgust in Windu's voice shocked Anakin. He was not the only one Mace Windu had not forgiven. The senior Master turned on his heel and entered the lift. "We failed these beings once. We will not do so again. Await our comm."

Anakin passed the time performing a rigorous meditation-in-motion sequence that left his breathing ragged and his mind blank and clear. He sprang out of his backbend into a handstand on his fingertips. _Serenity. Serenity. Give me serenity_, he begged the Force. _I've given up everything for you. It's the least you can do._

The comm beeped from the pile of his over-robe, belt, and boots. Anakin catapulted the distance, called the thing into his palm, and barked, "Skywalker here."

"We've found them, Anakin," Obi-Wan reported breathlessly.

Anakin sat down abruptly. "Where?"

"In a warren of storerooms below the Senate building. Apparently Sidious kept some inconvenient objects out of the way down here. No holocrons or other dark artifacts that we've found, but…"

"Master, the Skiratas?" he pressed gently.

"All the clones and the former Jedi are here in stasis pods. Their life signs are so slow they're barely detectable. It's no wonder Zey had trouble sensing them. Go tell Kal. We're bringing them back now. They'll be there in no more than twenty minutes. And remember Master Che's orders about them, Anakin. No unplanned physical strain." Obi-Wan sounded pained. "Try to keep them where they are."

Anakin ran to Kal's cell but hesitated outside it. A sudden disturbance was likely to send the poor man into another panic attack. He knocked gently but firmly.

"Come in," the older man's weary voice called.

Anakin stepped inside but made sure the door closed behind him. He did not think the healers would appreciate the disruption this was sure to cause.

Kal nodded welcome. He was stretched out on his bed, the blanket pulled up to his waist but no farther. The window stood wide open, as it always did in each of the escapees' rooms, even at night.

"They found them," Anakin reported. "They're all in stasis, and they're bringing them to the Temple for controlled release."

Kal was already up and perched on the edge of his bed, grabbing for his shoes. The door opened behind Anakin before he could deliver the bad news.

"You," Master Caudle said grimly, "aren't going anywhere." He crossed his arms and stood legs shoulder width apart, prepared to weather the ensuing juggernaut.

Kal looked up, enraged need flashing across his face at such a seemingly heartless denial of his paternal duty and rights. "Those are my _sons_-"

"Who will be here within fifteen minutes, still in stasis and in no way conscious. Feel free to wait in the hangar for the pods, if you want. Face it, Mister Skirata. Your presence won't do them any good. In your fragile state, you're likely to hurt yourself, and where will they be then?"

Kal glowered at him, but his mellowed common sense took over again. He crossed his arms in reluctant resignation. "Fine. I get to see them as soon as they arrive?"

Caudle had the sense to negotiate. "You can see the pods and, after necessary medical checks and, in the case of the clones, administration of the anti-aging treatment, be present when each of them is awakened."

He nodded shortly, thus accepting the deal.

Master Caudle shot Anakin a bland look. "I'll inform you once they're five minutes away." He left.

Kal continued tugging his boots on, muttering in _Mando'a_. "I know he's right. I'm not going to be any use right now, but fierfek, those are my sons!" He felt tempted to throw his boot across the room, but instead got it on with a decisive yank.

A type of kinship he rarely felt with Jedi loosened Anakin's tongue. "I know," he said with a sigh as he stared at his boots. "It doesn't seem fair sometimes. That parents can't make everything all right just by being there." Kal looked at him. The look was measuring, careful, and surprisingly compassionate. "They're yours, aren't they? Luke and Leia Amidala are your kids."

Anakin stood as still as if he had been turned to stone. Strangely, he felt no jolt of alarm, just a release of tightness somewhere under his breastbone, like a fist clenched hard to ward off pain had relaxed as a spasm passed. So someone finally noticed, someone finally asked, someone would finally _know_. "Yes," he answered in a flat whisper, and the word shot through him like the hottest blaster bolt. The rest poured of his mouth in an eager rush. "Yes, they're my children. They're my son and daughter. I'm their father." Such sweet words that he wanted to repeat over and over, to shout to the planet and the galaxy…released just this once, where only one person could hear them. He slid to the ground, back to the door, hugged his knees, and stared up at the other being. A Mandalorian he barely knew was to be his judge, jury, and exonerator, it seemed.

Kal smiled sadly at him. "Figured. They look like you."

Anakin was about to deny it. No one at the Temple had ever guessed. Only Yoda, Mace Windu, Obi-Wan, Ferris, and Veenna knew. Then again, when he thought about it, Jedi, observant though they were, were strangers to the intricacies of family resemblance. A casual observer wouldn't see that Luke's eyes matched Anakin's and make the mental leap required to connect them genetically. Kal had spent eight years on Kamino, and three more years surrounded by clones on Coruscant. Without Force perception to make the going easier, he must have mastered recognizing subtle differences in appearance and behavior. That expertise translated into picking up on subtle similarities, as well, such as the shade of Luke's eyes in certain lights, or the way Leia's hair curled at the ends when it was wet, both similarities Anakin had noticed and treasured.

Kad's grandfather waited patiently for the Jedi to share if he felt like it. And he did feel like it. He'd never been able to talk about this with anyone, not once in eleven years. "You can't tell anyone," he said. "They don't know, and they can never find out."

Kal saddened. "Must be hard."

"I was young, and probably stupid," Anakin said. It felt like a confession. "I fell in love, and she did too, and it all worked for a few years, keeping it quiet, then-"

Kal nodded. Well, he had experience with secret Jedi liaisons. "Senator Amidala?"

A pang burned through Anakin. _Padme._ "Yeah."

"What happened?"

Anakin teetered on the edge of laying out the whole truth for him: his confused swamp of feelings as he neared a fall to the dark side, the whisper of the Force in a youngling's ear that alerted the Council to their impending doom-_"Master Windu, did you know that we're all going to die?"_-his horrified confession of his marriage to Mace Windu as the other pulled his lightsaber on him, Obi-Wan's anguish, the battle in the Chancellor's office, killing the man he had thought was his friend, afterward. A sense of discretion stopped him. Kal had enough problems without Anakin heaping old burdens on him. Anyway, there was some truth to Obi-Wan's assertion that there were some things non-Force-sensitives just couldn't understand.

"It…came up, and the Council gave me a choice. We already knew we would give them to the Jedi-the best thing for them, being Force-sensitive. So I…" He trailed off.

Kal looked away. "Her or them, I guess."

The thought ached, but it had the ring of truth. "I miss her every day," he admitted, and unbidden tears spilled from his eyes. "But they make it worth it-most days."

Kal looked back at him from studying the pincer-shaped formation of thrantcills flying outside the window. "I understand leaving your wife for the sake of your kids. The other part, not letting them know- Can't say the same. Don't you miss being their father?"

"Yes," Anakin said wretchedly, scrubbing at his eyes. "But-" He looked up, and even though Kal looked nothing like Kad, there was something, the look in the eyes maybe, that was just similar enough to send a spike of reminder through him. He clung to it, grateful and relieved. "But if I hadn't stayed, I wouldn't know any of them at all. Kad, Luke, Leia, Mara…." He shrugged and felt a genuine smile on his face, though admittedly it was a bit watery. "I'm glad I did. And whatever they need me to be, I'll be. Now they need a brother and a mentor. I can be that. Someday they'll need a friend. I can be that too."

Kal nodded, not smiling, but Anakin sensed something bordering on approval.

Now that he had honest approval of his actions, not Obi-Wan's empathy or Yoda's understanding or either of his mentors' forgiveness, but honest-to-Force approval, he found he didn't really need it anymore. He didn't need another to exonerate him for his past, mistakes or no. True acceptance came from within. That Jedi truism aside, Kal's approval was appreciated.

He stood, feeling as fresh as a drought-stricken land after a new rain, and held out a hand. "Come on. Let's go meet your sons."

* * *

><p>Breath returned first. His lungs expanded as they drew in a deep, wheezing gasp of air. He gasped like a drowning man pulled from the water. <em>Thump-thump. Thump-thump.<em> A deep, regular tempo beat in his head, the veins in his wrists, his chest. A heartbeat. Someone's heart was beating. _My heart._ The thought crawled sluggishly to the surface of his muddled awareness. He lay still as he listened to its measured count. _I am alive._ He turned the words over. They were right. He was alive. The thought filled him with pleasure for some reason he didn't quite remember. Ah, well. It would come to him.

_Who am I?_ He answered his own question with military precision. _N-11 Ordo Skirata, Null-class. Captain of the Grand Army of the Republic. Son of Kal Skirata. Husband of Besany Wennen. _Now that was an answer _Buir_ would be proud of: complete and succinct, no timed wasted and no area left untended. He ran himself through diagnostics of mental functions. He tested his memory for faces, names, numbers, coordinates, basic facts. His eidetic memory produced the information readily.

That complete, he focused for the first time on the obvious issue. _I've been out of it for a bit._ A trickle of unease leaked through his surface calm. _What happened?_

Ordo forced his eyes open. Bright light blinded him.

An oval silhouette hovered over him, black as deep space. "Son? _Ord'ika_?"

It was Kal. Ordo smiled fuzzily. "_Buir_. I knew you'd come." At his words, the memories came surging back. Ordo shot upright, only to be smacked by a wave of dizziness. The world spun, a bright miasma of color. He clutched the sides of the stasis pod. "They caught us, _Buir_. The _hut'uune_ kriffing _caught_ us."

Kal's strained chuckle came from somewhere to his right. "Well, you can't win every battle, son."

Ordo reached out a hand and felt for his father. Two hands caught his and clenched it hard. "They put us in stasis," Ordo growled. "They _put us in stasis_."

"To keep you out of the way, I guess, son. You and your brothers and _Bard'ika_ in jail were more than they could handle, the bastards."

"Cowards," Ordo spat out vehemently. He tried to clamber out of the pod, but Kal caught his shoulder.

"Son, just stay put for now, okay? You're a little weak. It will take a few minutes for your strength to come back."

Ordo blinked his bleary eyes. Kal was still a blurry outline. "Where is everyone, _Buir_?"

"We're all here, son. It's okay."

Reluctantly the Null lay back in the pod and willed his body to recover. He relived the last horrific hours in his memory: the jump to awareness at the sounds of an attack, the capture, loaded into a speeder bus in a state of half-consciousness, his father and three others singled out and taken elsewhere. He had been sure they would be lined up against a building in some alleyway and shot execution-style, or maybe even be tortured for information they didn't have.

Worst of all was when they marched him through dark tunnels he knew were underground to a room with a row of stasis pods that waited, sterile and gleaming, evil maws open to swallow him and his brothers alive. He fought and they smashed the butt of a blaster on the back of his head for it. Stunned, he still writhed as they forced him into a pod and connected him to a swarm of tubes and wires. As the drugs began to shut down his system, the lid closed with a snap, trapping him in a coffin of airless darkness while his father and wife were tortured and murdered. A tube down his throat choked off his horrified shriek of denial, and then the looming blackness seized him. His worst nightmare, come true.

But it was over. Kal had rescued them, as he always did. _How could I ever doubt that a man like _Kal'buir_ would defeat the aruetiise and come back for us?_ He had never doubted it, not really. Kal Skirata was everything Ordo could ever want to be: bold, compassionate, inventive, decisive, caring, a natural leader. The perfect Mando. The perfect father. Ordo knew that he deified his father in his thoughts into the wrath of Mandalore incarnate. He didn't care. The assessment was one hundred percent accurate. Time and time again Kal had proven this. This little incident was merely one more to add to the list.

Ordo felt his functions return to normal. He stretched his brawny arms high in the air. His stomach rumbled in monstrous hunger. "I'm starved, _Buir_." He peered around. The room began to resolve itself into a small chamber with pink walls and a rectangular window, open, through which he could hear the blares of traffic. Kal sharpened into a short, wiry figure dressed in loose white garments. His hand rested on Ordo's shoulder. The Null tweaked the sleeve of the white shirt. "Did you break out of prison in your nightgown, _Buir_?" he teased.

His father laughed lightly, but Ordo heard a bleak, rancid undertone. He went cold. "_Shab_, I missed you, _Ord'ika_," Kal croaked tearfully.

Ordo struggled to a sitting position. Frigid dread constricted his stomach. "How long's it been, _Buir_?" Kal hesitated. "_How long, _Buir_?_" Ordo blinked the last haziness from his eyes. He stared at his father, mouth open. A worn old man looked back at him. "Eleven years, son," he said with a sad smile. Where once Kal had possessed a small but fit body, now he was thin and frail. His washed out skin and haunted eyes like spectral blue lights gave him the appearance of a small, sad ghost about to fade away, even though he was wreathed in noonday sunlight.

Ordo caught his father's hand on his shoulder and felt the weak, gnarled fingers. How hard he must have squeezed Ordo's hand to impart the illusion of vigor and health, just so his son would have a few happy moments. "Oh…oh, _Buir_," Ordo moaned. Hot tears burned his eyes. _Eleven years! _

His fingers clenched the sides of the pod. He _hated_ this metal coffin. It had stolen a decade from his family. He wanted to rip it to pieces, smash it against the wall until it shattered, make it _hurt_. But it was only a machine. "I want out." He braced his hands against the side and dropped his feet over the edge. When he left go, his feet landed, but his legs crumpled. He fell to his knees. "_Buir_," he rasped desperately.

Kal knelt beside him-so insubstantial. His mighty father, diminished. Ordo flung his arms around him and wept in utter despair. Kal stroked his hair and murmured in his ear. For an eternity they held one another on the floor, now silent.

At last Ordo drew a shuddering breath and sat back. Keeping his hand on Kal's arm-no way was he ever letting go now-he took stock of his surroundings. A raised platform that bore a pallet and blanket sat against the far wall. A set of loose white clothes were folded neatly at the foot of the improvised bed, while a pair of slipper-like shoes sat on the floor nearby. His size, he saw. He looked down at the rubbery black bodysuit they had cinched him in as they prepared him for the stasis pod. He stood, ripped off the cursed garment, and roughly dressed in the white clothes. "Where are we, _Buir_?" he asked, tone clipped as he fought back another wave of despair. He had to take care of his father now, whatever happened.

Kal eased himself to a standing position. "The Jedi Temple, son. It's a long story."

_Jedi._ The esoteric Temple recluses currently occupied a very low position on Ordo's list of things of importance in the galaxy. Kal numbered one at the moment, his brothers and Besany tied for second. As he pulled the light shirt over his head, his fingers found a clump in his shorn hair. He pulled his hand away to see fingers stained a suspicious rusty color. Caked blood clotted his hair from when one of the black ops whipped him with the butt of his blaster. A bitter laugh tore itself from his throat. He still bled from a decade-old wound while Kal…

He whirled to see his father leaning against the wall. "Are you hurt, _Ord'ika_?" The worry in his voice blew Ordo away. Kal was putting him first even now?

"I'm fine, _Buir_. What happened, why are we here? Are we really all here?"

Kal pulled him over to the bed and made him sit. "I'll be honest with you, Ordo. It's not good."

Ordo straightened his body like the soldier he was. "I can take it, _Buir_. Pull no punches."

"Have I ever?" Kal joked with a gleam in his eye.

Heartened by the humor, Ordo shook his head.

Kal said, "Good news first. You all received the anti-aging treatment while you were still in stasis. You'll age normally from now on. The war is over. The Jedi made sure that all the clones got aging treatment, citizenship, and veterans' benefits. Fi was on Mandalore the whole time. He has a daughter, and he's here now. We're all alive, and Besany is expected to make a full recovery from the conditions of the prison we were in. Mird has a baby, and it's here. _Kad'ika_ is here. We're all together again, Ordo. That's what's important."

Ordo closed his eyes. "Tell me the rest." He kept his eyes closed as Kal related everything else. Wave after terrible wave battered him, left him breathless with loss. His father and wife locked in tiny cells for eleven years, Mird abandoned and alone in the Lower Levels, _Kad'ika_ brainwashed into being a Jedi. He opened his eyes and stared at his father. "What are we going to do?" he pleaded, sounding like the child he had once been.

Kal wrapped him in a hug. "We'll go home, son. Once the Jedi feel we're well enough, we'll go home."

"Jedi," Ordo growled. The redness of hellfire flickered at the edge of his vision, Mando madness enticing him with its promise of quick vengeance and a furious release of the pain.

Leave under the Jedi's direction? He wanted to hunt down every last one of them and leave the Temple littered with broken corpses, its fine marble floors smeared with blood. They had taken everything from his family, enslaved them, captured them, violated them in the greatest possible way by indoctrinating _Kad'ika_ until he was one of them, and now they had the audacity to step in and play the heroes? He sprang to his feet.

Kal stood and caught his arm. "Ordo, listen to me-" he began, when a disturbance in the hall caused them to pause. Ordo heard a familiar voice shouting. He rushed to the door and slid it open.

A blond male Jedi staggered away from an open door across the hall, a hand clutching his nose as blood welled between his fingers.

Mereel advanced on him, screaming in animal rage. "Where is he? Where's _Kad'ika_?" he bellowed. The shadow of madness contorted his face. His eyes looked almost crimson. Mereel grabbed the unresisting Jedi by the front of his tunic and shook violently, bashing the man's head against the wall. "_Where is he?_"

"_Check!_" Kal shouted.

Ordo and Mereel went rigid with an instinct cemented in them by years of careful training. The Jedi Mereel had attacked stumbled away from him, eyes wide as one hand grasped his lightsaber at his belt.

Mereel turned slowly until his gaze fell on Kal. The vicious fire in his eyes died away. "_Buir_, they stole _Kad'ika_," he groaned as he crossed the hall to fold his father in a gentle but desperate hug. "He won't tell me where the _shab_ he is."

"Mereel Skirata, you will not attack anyone in this building again unless I specifically order you to," Kal commanded sternly. "That man is Kad's friend."

"_Friend?_" Mereel shrilled. He whirled to glare at the Jedi, who stood his ground. Past the stream of blood from the nose and the back of his head, Ordo recognized the man as General Skywalker, who looked not a day older than the last time he had seen him glorified on the holonews. Resentment boiled in Ordo's stomach. The sanctimonious mystics got to live forever, while his _buir_ died slowly of old age.

Kal floored him by giving the Jedi a friendly nod. "_Su'cuy_, Anakin." Skywalker laughed a little unsteadily and gingerly felt his head. "'So you're still alive.' Oddly appropriate."

"You might want to go. I have to give the kids a short lesson on manners."

"I'll do that." He backed away, attention on Mereel and Ordo, around the corner.

"Lucky we're in the Healing Halls," Kal muttered. Then he glared at Mereel. "Did you hear me? You will not attack any Jedi again."

"I will," Mereel vowed tearfully. "I'll murder every last one of them. You didn't hear Kad scream, _Buir_. I want to hear _them_ scream!"

Kal crossed his arms. "The Jedi are the only family _Kad'ika_'s ever known, _Mer'ika_. He loves them. You are not going to hurt him any worse than he's already been hurt by turning on them. That man helped raise him with love and affection as rich as any Mando's. And how do you thank him? With a broken nose and a concussion. That's not going to fly, son. In my book, attempted murder does not equal gratitude."

"But-"

Kal jabbed a finger in Mereel's chest. "_No. Buts._"

Ordo's brother slumped. "Yes, sir." Then his head came up with a jerk. "But I will kill the one who stole him," he snarled brutally.

Ordo wanted in on the action. They both had perfect recall and so could identify the man easily. With their four Null brothers in tow, it would be a simple matter to swarm the man who had destroyed Kad's life and rip him apart.

But Kal straightened to his full height-which didn't even bring him level with their chins-and trapped both of them with his Father Stare. "Sons, I owe that man my life. It's because of his orders that none of us were killed." He smiled faintly as if reading their minds. "You will not slice him up into deli-sized portions."

Ordo moaned. "No, _Buir_, don't say it like that! We'll never be able to touch him."

Kal took a step forward. "Saved my life," he enunciated clearly.

Ordo clenched his fists, tempted to disobey his father for once and rampage these peaceful halls until the monster lay dead at his feet. "_Ord'ika_." Just a statement, no emphasis or pressure.

His hands relaxed as he once more bowed to Kal's wishes. What more could he do?

"Thanks, son."

Ordo whimpered and dragged both Kal and Mereel into a hug. "_Ad'ike_, we're together again," his father's voice counseled. "That's what's important. Now let's go see your brothers."

* * *

><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	15. Chapter 15 Fi and Food

**This chapter and the one after it are more filler than anything else. They're fun and fairly entertaining (I hope), but mostly they're about Clan Skirata and the Jedi interacting, mainly light with a few serious moments. The more serious part of the story with Kad will resume in Chapter 17. If that's all you're interested in, feel free to skip these two, but I hope you won't. :)**

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 15 Fi and Food<p>

Ordo could not get over Fi's sideburns. First and foremost was the fact that he had any at all. None of Ordo's brothers had ever sported that particular hairstyle, which made for itchy ears inside a helmet. Second was the fact that they were gray. "You look so old," he marveled, only half joking as the whole family, minus Kad and A'den, who did not take well to stasis, gathered in the lounge Vau had claimed as theirs. The ten new clones and Jusik ensconced themselves on the remaining chairs and coaches, or on a particular patch of floor. Ordo sat on a couch with Besany, one arm around her back, her head against his shoulder. She was older, but still his same radiant Besany. Laseema practically sat on Atin, more at his insistence than hers.

Fi brushed his sideburns with a smug smile. "I prefer to think of them as distinguished. I'm the oldest brother now, you know."

Ordo drew up at this unspoken challenge to his dominance. He had always headed the Nulls, and the Nulls headed the clones.

Fi recanted when he realized that this assertion aroused his brother's disagreement. "Well, you know. Chronologically." He perched on the arm of a couch where Darman, Corr, and Niner sat. Fi examined his fingernails and waited.

The silence stretched out until Jaing sighed. "Fine, I'll bite. What?"

Fi mimed stabbing himself with a saber. "Ouch. Why is it that no one's asked about my daughter? Are you people deaf? You're uncles now!" Darman, to Fi's right, tensed and looked away. His Adam's apple bobbed as he gulped rapidly, trying not to cry.

Fi looked blankly at him for a minute. "You okay, Dar? Want to see a picture?" He pulled out a pocket sized black disc with an opalescent dome in its center. He thumbed the switch, and a stream of light beamed from the dome and coagulated into a 3-D image. A little girl with a boyish mop of curly black hair and sun-browned skin grinned up at someone the picture didn't show. One front tooth was missing. She clutched a child's version of a beskad in one hand, gripped at the proper angle, point down when thumb pointed up, so as to deliver proper backhand slashes. The kid was obviously pleased with herself for holding the saber correctly. Ordo could spot Fi's wry impudence from a parsec away, and hoped Parja's common sense tempered that blasted "witty" streak a bit.

Fi typified the besotted father as he chatted on about Warrez. "She's a natural with a beskad. She could hold it properly when she was eighteen months old! Once, when I asked her to show me what she could do, she nearly nailed me in the jugular! The quickest little devil you ever saw. I think she looks like me," he added as he held the album under Corr's nose. The former trooper crossed his eyes to be able to see it. "She's got your smile," he said belatedly.

"I know!" Fi crowed. "I never realized how rewarding being a father could be! You guys have no idea-"

Darman's head jerked up like Fi had punched him. "No," he snapped. "I don't!"

Fi realized too late his mistake. "Oh, fierfek, Dar!" He looked down at his album and quickly hid it behind his back. "He's okay, Dar!" he exclaimed. "He's had a good life!"

Darman opened his mouth, but Fi charged on. "I know he hasn't had us as a clan, but I bet he's had the best role models you could ever want right here." He gestured widely at the Temple.

"I-" Darman tried.

Fi rushed on headfirst to his own annihilation. "That blue Twi'lek is his Master. From what I've seen, they're really close. She's probably been like his mother." Fi's eyes widened in horror at the implications of Etain forgotten and meaningless. Desperately he tried to smooth it over. Ordo wondered whether he should knock him unconscious and put him out of his misery. "And Skywalker and Kenobi- They pretty much raised him. I'm sure they've been like fathers to him-"

Darman blinked at him, more surprised than anything else.

Fi spun and ran from the room. He nearly bowled the healer in the doorway over. Kal charged after him even as Master Che put out a hand to stop him.

She swore impressively. "I _told_ him not to exert himself!" She made to go after them.

Darman, though, stood slowly and held out a hand. His expression was polite, clear-eyed, and vulnerable. "Hello. I'm Kad's father, Darman Skirata."

She looked at his large, bronze-skinned hand, then at him with a dawning of understanding. "Of course," she murmured. She took his hand and they shook slowly and deliberately. "I'm Vokara Che, Kad's Master. You have a wonderful son, talented and selfless. You should be proud."

"I want to be."

"You will be. He wants to see you." Ordo heard a hint of insincerity in her words. Kad was scared to meet his father. That's why he wasn't here now.

"He's eleven now?" Darman asked.

"Twelve."

The clone winced and stared at the floor. "For Mandos, thirteen is when you come of age. He's almost an adult. He was a baby when I last saw him. He won't remember me at all."

Master Che blinked, eyes a bit misty, and rested a long-fingered hand lightly on his shoulder. "He wants to meet you."

"Then where is he?"

She struggled to choose the right words. "Everything's changing for him. He's confused, he's scared to disappoint you. But he does want to meet you. Give him time." That, Ordo judged, was the whole truth.

Darman nodded and appeared to search in vain for the words to say what he wanted to. At last he settled for: "It's…an honor to meet you." "No," she returned softly. "The honor is all mine."

Then, just like that, the empathetic woman vanished, leaving in her place a brisk healer. She turned to the room. "You're father's an idiot," she informed those assembled. "If he wasn't on his way back right now-leaning on Fi, of course-I would sic every one of you on him and make sure he never got a moment's peace."

Ordo assured her grimly, "You wouldn't have to do that. We're on it." He berated himself for letting Kal run out the door alone. With yet another limp and a decade of malnutrition and enforced inactivity, the last thing he needed was to run anywhere. Really, his velocity should be limited to a leisurely trot, max.

She raised her eyebrows at the aggressive set of his jaw. "I can see that. Well, in three weeks I release him into your capable hands. Now, the reason I came here. Does A'den have any…biological irregularities?"

That didn't sound good. "Why, what's wrong?"

She held up her hands to prevent him from starting from the room. "He's still incapacitated."

"Symptoms?" Ordo barked.

She returned quickly, "Mainly extreme nausea and vertigo. A continuous migraine and skin irritation have also manifested themselves. He's so sick he throws up whenever he moves, basically. I had thought they keyed the wrong combination of drugs for him, but all the chemical signatures and amounts balance out."

Prudii cursed eloquently. "He's allergic is what it is. The poor _dikut_ got laid low for a week when they put us in stasis _last _time, and we were only in there for two days. This was eleven kriffing years!"

Master Che stood still as she absorbed that unfortunate information. "Well, that's bad. If he continues in his current condition, he'll either die from dehydration or starve to death, unless we hook him up to an IV. Frankly, I don't recommend it. Your brother is miserable. It could take days to flush out his system the conventional way."

Ordo was already out of the room, the other four Nulls close behind, at the word "miserable." The Jedi followed behind them at a discreet distance and waited to one side of the doorway as they crowded into A'den's healing cell.

Their brother lay curled in on himself on the floor instead of the bed, dressed only in the white pants the healers had provided. A pair of healer gently ministered to him. One held a bedpan for him to throw up into and wiped the yellowish bile off his mouth when possible, while the other crouched over him with fingertips resting lightly on his temples, eyes closed.

Prudii reached out and touched his hair. "A'den," he whispered, "it's us."

A'den only moaned and wretched.

The Bith healer with the bedpan looked up at him sympathetically. "You won't get a reaction. Your voice doesn't even register."

Ordo clenched his teeth at the unfairness of the galaxy. They had survived all this-more or less-only for A'den to… He whirled to face Master Che in the doorway. "Well?"

"If he is allergic, then effectively he's been slowly poisoned over the last eleven years. Physically it was only-" She eyed his chin. He raised a hand and brushed bristly stubble on his chin and cheeks. "-three, four days, so he wasn't killed by it then. Now that his systems are speeding up, its toxicity is taking effect."

"Can't you do something?"

She raised her hands. "We can't heal allergies. As it is, the chemicals have permeated his body: his stomach, skin, liver, lungs, heart…"

They both looked at A'den as she trailed off. He moaned and vomited again. His eyelids flickered as if caught in an unsettling dream.

_The nightmare's what he finds when he wakes up_, Ordo thought with a swelling of bitterness and helpless rage like bile in his own throat. He hated feeling helpless. His clan could do anything, withstand any storm, overcome any threat and make it pay for menacing them- But they had stumbled, tripped over their own overconfidence, if Kal was to be believed, and had suffered eleven years of hell for one night of negligence. And the continued price of that slipup? Impotence. He felt useless. He couldn't turn back the clock and give Kal a life of bliss with his children and grandchildren, couldn't erase the lines around Besany's hollow eyes, couldn't present Dar with a straight-backed Mando son who would continue his legacy, couldn't heal A'den- He _hated_ this. But Kal had told him to, if not like the Jedi, then at least present a façade of civility toward them. And, he thought with not a hint of amusement, he copied the majority of the galaxy when push came to shove and demanded that they do something when he couldn't. Fine. He'd play along.

"You have to do something," he snapped. "You're Jedi, for crying out loud." _There. Prove me wrong. I dare you._

She narrowed her eyes at him but otherwise didn't acknowledge the veiled challenge. Then her attention turned to A'den. She leaned down and touched a hand to his head, eyes closed. Ordo waited in exasperation for the wizardry to end and the real medicine to begin. That he could relate to. That he could understand. She looked at the other healers, expression turning steely with seriousness. "I want a full pore ventilation. Now."

The two launched into action immediately, whisking poor A'den out of the room. This resulted in an unfortunate misunderstanding and many raised voices, but at last Ordo bullied and begged his way into getting permission to see his brother during the operation.

A'den lay on a raised table with three healers who skimmed their fingertips lightly over him with expressions of deep inner concentration. His pores gaped widely enough for Ordo to see them, and steam rose from them. A'den, lucky, was out of it, because the whole experience struck him as vastly uncomfortable.

"What exactly is this?" he hissed to the unshakable Twi'lek who, according to his sources, was his nephew's Master.

"We're flushing his system of impurities. It's very unpleasant-looking, isn't it?" She shuddered slightly. "But it should start the healing process. I predict he'll feel better in a few days."

Ordo stared at his brother, skin pock-marked and red, in the fetal position, unresponsive. "He'd better."

Master Che crossed her arms and glared at him. "Will you stop threatening me? I'm trying to help him. Why are you so reluctant to admit that we aren't actually your enemies?"

Ordo shrugged grudgingly. "You categorize a group as one thing long enough, and it knocks your whole way of thinking out of sync when they do something out of line with that definition, I guess," he grunted. "The jury's still out on you guys." He would at least do Kal-and Kad-the respect of reconsidering his position, but he didn't have to like it. His stomach gurgled loudly, interrupting his reverie. He turned to Master Che a little plaintively. "I haven't eaten in eleven years. Where's the food?"

She rolled her eyes and pointed. "The dining hall is that way. Follow the scent of cooking."

Ordo did just that.

* * *

><p>Anakin had just entered the dining hall when a hand slapped him painfully on the back.<p>

"Hey, buddy," Mereel Skirata drawled, a half-personable, half-predatory smile on his face.

Anakin jerked out of his reach. "What do you want?" he snapped. Mereel's smile grew slightly wider. "I just wanted to say hi. That's no crime, is it?"

Anakin was glad the dining hall was crowded with beings eager for lunch. Otherwise he would happily have ignited his lightsaber, just to be safe. "Leave me alone," he said slowly and firmly.

Mereel feigned big-eyed injury. "Why? Don't you like me?"

"No, I don't. You broke my nose and gave me a concussion and a skull fracture."

Mereel studied his face. "You look fine now. Just a bit of bruising, right? No harm done."

Anakin rubbed his still tender nose. "Look, I already have trouble with nosebleeds. You probably just made it worse. And so I don't like you. Goodbye." He spun on his heel and got in the meal line.

"Hey." Mereel grabbed his shoulder.

Anakin shrugged him off. He was in no mood to deal with this infuriating man's idea of fun, or his sadistic theatrics.

Mereel inserted himself into Anakin's field of vision. He looked a little chagrinned. "I need your help."

He received a glower in return. "Oh really? Maybe you should have considered that before you attacked me."

Mereel sighed and glared at the serving droid behind the counter. "Watch this." He picked up a tray and held it out for a serving of baked dru'un slices.

The droid, a silver-plated humaniform equipped with a set of wheels instead of legs, slapped its scoop down on the counter in front of him with a _clang_. "Halt," it warbled in a flat monotone. "You have already passed through this line. You are not authorized for second helpings."

"But that wasn't me!" Mereel protested in frustration, throwing his hands up. "I've told you five times! That was my brother Kom'rk. We're not the same person. I'm Mereel."

"Nice try," the serving droid returned with shrewd self-satisfaction. "You will not receive second helpings just because you are calling yourself by a different name. Back away, miscreant."

Mereel wheeled to face Anakin. "See? It let Niner, Fi, and Kom'rk through. Now it thinks I'm Kom'rk, and when Atin tried coming through, it thought he was Niner. It won't let us eat!" His aggravation was so evident Anakin couldn't help but warming to him a little. Just a little.

"All right, just a second." He glanced at the droid's certification. K3. "Listen, K3." He gestured Mereel forward. "This man is not the same as Kom'rk. They are two separate people. I'll vouch for him as a Jedi Master." K3 had the same golden glowing photoreceptors as protocol droids, much like C-3PO had-though Anakin hadn't seen or heard from 3PO in eleven years. Droid photoreceptors were expressionless, but somehow the serving droid managed to give him a look much like a suspicious narrowing of the eyes. "Prove it."

Anakin looked around the crowded dining hall. Clan Skirata had chosen a table to themselves, though they were constantly attended by a few curious younglings who stood by and watched. Three of the clones attacked their meals heartily. The rest sat by and sulked, while the non-clones tried to soothe their wounded egos. The ex-Jedi, Bardan Jusik, looked distinctly uncomfortable and tried his best to get lost in the crowd of indignant clones. Anakin waved them over and lined them up with a muttered, "Sorry." Then he directed the other serving droids to join them. The hall grew quiet as everyone waited to see what would happen next. The commandos stood at attention. The Nulls looked belligerent and morose, with crossed arms and hooded glowers.

Anakin walked the line and named each of them with a little prompting. "See?" he asked the group of serving droids that watched. "They are, in fact, ten different people."

Silence. Then: "We don't believe you," the first droid said.

The clones exploded in an indignant chorus. "Oh, come on!" Mereel burst out. "We're hungry, we're right in front of you, and you don't believe what a Jedi Master says! What more do you want?"

"Liar," the droid said simply, and as one they rolled back to their stations. Mereel was open-mouthed in disbelief.

A little Ithorian girl in the new Krayt Dragon Clan was the first to giggle. Her clanmates followed suit. Veenna tried in vain to hush them, but when Anakin made eye contact with her, a smile tugging at his own lips, she stuffed her fingers into her mouth to keep from bursting into laughter herself. The amusement spread quickly among the younglings, then the younger Padawans, as many began to laugh or hoot or trill. They tried in vain to stifle it by biting fingers or pressing napkins to mouths, glancing apologetically at the clones. Then Yoda, who sat at a nearby table with an assortment of Knights and Masters, cackled in delight, and all hell broke loose. The room fairly sparkled with amusement in the Force. Clan Skirata was far from immune. Vau nearly inhaled his fish sauce as he guffawed shamelessly and pounded the table.

Mereel scowled grumpily at the flare of levity. "You can laugh," he growled at Anakin, who braced his hands against his knees in an attempt to keep upright. "You're not the one they're denying food to. And you're not a figment of Kom'rk's gluttonous desires." Kom'rk shot him a scandalized look.

Anakin laughed until he got the hiccups. "Sorry- _Hic!_ So sorry! Not-_hic!_-meaning to offend! They _don't believe in you!_ That's-_hic!_-hilarious! They even believe in Ferris, and no one can ever find him! Oh, this is the best thing that's-_hic!_-happened since the cleaning droids malfunctioned and over-waxed the floors and-_hic!_-we all had to skate everywhere. But they don't believe in you and you're right there- _Hic!_"

He felt Mara's surprise as she stepped into the dining hall late and found it in transformed into a lair of mirth. She stared around until she saw him and made a beeline for him with the air of someone rushing to contain a potentially catastrophic situation. "Geeze, Master, a little dignity? I have to be seen with you in public on a regular basis, you know." She grabbed his arm and pulled him upright, then tried to straighten his rumpled robes with a few inexpert tugs at the fabric. The little gesture prompted a swell of affection in him, and he ruffled her cascade of flaming red hair. She swatted his hand away. "What do you think I am, a kitten? And what the heck is going on? I haven't seen everyone this crazy since…ever."

Anakin wiped tears from his eyes. "I think the serving droids need a tune-up."

Mereel leaned toward him aggressively. "Well, get on with it."

Mara gave the clone a once-over. "This the guy who broke your nose?"

"Yes, why?"

Mara straightened and glared at Mereel. "I'll fight you for that." Anakin gaped in horror. "Mara!"

She glared up at him. "What? You said you wanted me to defend your honor."

Why, why, why were Padawans so selective and dense? Surely he hadn't been this bad when he was fourteen… Oh, wait. He'd been worse. Thoroughly regretting his wayward adolescence, Anakin dropped his head into his hands. "Mara, that was months ago, and that was against Leia, not a Null ARC with extreme prejudice."

"I can appreciate a reference to 'going hiking with extreme prejudice,'" Mereel approved. Then he looked down at Mara. "Snippy one, aren't you?"

Mara drew up indignantly. "Snippy?"

Mereel tousled her hair, which left her gaping in self-righteous shock. The clone clapped his hands and looked around cheerily. "Okay, people, here's the plan. _An'ika_, get twice your usual helping. Snips, based on those skinny arms you eat like a bird, so make that three. I get one of them; the others go to whoever gets there first. Sound like a plan? Great. Move out!" He pushed the stunned Jedi in the direction of the food line. "Go, go, go!" Anakin admitted defeat and got much more than his usual serving, enough to keep at least two clones happy (he hoped). Mara, in line behind him, precariously balanced two trays heaped with calorie-rich fair.

"Why are you going so far out of your way to accommodate them?" Anakin asked.

She shrugged noncommittally. "Why are you?"

Why was he? The answer to that question was easy. _Because I remember when the clones were our men, and we fought side by side with them and trusted them implicitly with our lives every day._ He had felt a strong bond with the clones, and a sense of responsibility to them, even an identification that was generally given only to those who were common members of a selective group.

Over the past eleven years, the two sets diverged and went their own separate ways. The Jedi's destiny remained largely the same; their war with the dark concluded, they warded off the wraithlike shadows that remained: war, injustice, cruelty. The clones' destiny transformed utterly: instead of faceless men created to die, they were fated to raise families, perform a thousand varieties of honest work, and grow old at an easy, natural rate. That deviation reduced the Jedi's and clones' basic relationship from deep empathy and codependence to strong camaraderie. They could comm, they could visit, they could reminisce until all the stars imploded, but things would never be just like "old times."

And so, seeing Mereel looking as young and martial as Rex, Cody, and all the others had when last their purpose was one called to a lonely echo Anakin felt somewhere in his chest. _Because I miss them._

"Because they need food," he said aloud.

"And we help the poor and oppressed, blah blah blah," Mara cut him off with an annoyed wave. "See you." She trotted over and plunked her laden trays down at the Skirata table, where they were set upon by ravenous clones. She snatched her hands away just before they would have been impaled by Jaing's fork.

Anakin joined Obi-Wan but watched and listened.

Mereel grabbed her sleeve and plunked her into an empty chair before she could escape. "Well well well, look who it is. Snips."

"The name's Mara Jade."

"Don't care. Snips it is."

Mara scowled and began to eat her own food. She and Mereel exchanged harmless banter for a few minutes until Mereel made an innocuous-sounding comment that almost had Anakin across the room, but

Obi-Wan grabbed the back of his tunic, not even looking up from his food. "Let it be, Anakin. Just let it be."

Mara squinted at the offending clone. "Are you hitting on me?" Mereel leaned an elbow on the table and waggled his eyebrows. "I don't know. Am I?"

"I'm only fourteen."

"I'm thirteen."

Mara slapped a hand on the table like a judge with a gavel. "Ha. Twenty-four. Years in stasis count."

He grinned. "Okay, okay. So are you committed?"

"Yes, actually." She tweaked her braid with a rueful face.

Mereel heaved a lovelorn sigh. "All right. Say-" He leaned forward and whispered something in her ear.

A surprised grin dawned on her face. "That could be fun."

Mereel laughed and slung an arm across her shoulders. "You've got guts, kid. Stick with me and we'll go places."

Anakin had a bad feeling about this.

* * *

><p><strong>Please review. Seriously, I know some people are reading this. Please, say something!<strong>

**mad'ika**


	16. Chapter 16 The Antics of an ARC

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 16: The Antics of an ARC<p>

Mace Windu enjoyed peacetime much more than he had war. Though his particular style of fighting awoke an addictive inner thrill in the midst of combat, he much preferred the more leisurely, reliable forms of recreation that peacetime afforded. Despite his drastically deviant lightsaber form, he appreciated a set schedule and rules, tried-and-true methods and adherence to edicts. A firm foundation. Absolutes.

The arrival of this Clan Skirata raised many concerns that disrupted his orderly routine, and rightly so. If Quinlan Vos had indeed stolen Kad Skir'ta, as the one named Mereel claimed, then a serious investigation was in order. Luckily, Vos was currently on a mission in the far Outer Rim, and the clan knew of that particular Jedi only by reputation, not by face. Otherwise, he was sure, heads would roll, not necessarily just Vos's, and not necessarily just Mereel's.

He and Yoda spent a somber half hour in the Council Room alone as they discussed the implications of this. "Legal it was," the ancient Grandmaster mused as he rubbed his chin. "Automatic custody of Force-sensitive children we have. But _right_ was it? The Jedi way was it? Hmmm… Speak to him, I would. Hear his side, we must before draw conclusions we do. If kidnap this child he did, severe will the repercussions be, to us and to him."

Mace sighed and stood. "I'll tell Master Ban-yaro that when Vos comms, he must be relayed to us. And…I think it best, Master, if we have him stay in the Outer Rim until further notice."

Yoda's ears curled as he smiled craftily up at the much taller, much younger Master of the Council. "Keep him in one piece we should, hmmm?"

"To deal with as we deem just," he answered, and stepped out the door. Before he knew what was happening, his feet skidded out from under him and he fell face first toward a floor that was incredibly shiny, considering- His hands shot out and cushioned his landing. Then his palms slipped on the oily floor and shot forward at a velocity that jarred his shoulders. He impacted just hard enough to drive the breath out his lungs in a massive _woof_.

As Mace Windu, one of the greatest Jedi Masters who had ever lived, lay flat on his face on the lubricated, extremely slippery ground, he had the strangest feeling that he had been pranked. Triumphant snickering from behind the slitted door of the lift directly across from him added weight to his suspicion. He raised his head as slowly as an offended dragon. The lift door slid shut with incriminating speed.

A mantra of _Jedi do not take revenge_ running grimly through his head, he braced his hands and pushed upward until his body was arched in a pushup position. Then his hands flew out from beneath him and he was down again. Several more unsuccessful attempts to right himself ended only in his spilling over backwards instead of forwards. As he shinnied on his back off the greased patch of floor, with Yoda's chortle in his ears, he clenched his teeth and vowed to accept the humiliation as a part of life-an annoying, degrading part of life that he would just as soon skip.

* * *

><p>"That was a great idea!" Mara gasped out between snickers as she and Mereel watched through a crack in the lift door.<p>

Master Windu wiggled like a flirtatious sea serpent across the floor. Mereel slapped a button and whisked them off to a distant floor before the Jedi colossus they had pranked could regain his feet and come after them. He and the errant redhead Padawan slid down to sit with their backs against the door, feet out. Their body language was as casual as if the elevator was their secret base. He threw a comradely arm over his new friend's shoulders. "See, Snips? I knew as soon as I saw you that you could enjoy a good joke. With my brains and your knowledge of the terrain, we'll wreak havoc on their peaceful existence."

Mara elbowed him in the ribs. "Nothing too bad, remember. I have to live here when you go home."

Mereel stretched luxuriously. "Hey, I just want to give you guys a little something to remember me by."

* * *

><p>Anakin had no illusions about the perpetrators of the prank Mace Windu infamously befell. His idiot Padawan was behind it. Her and Mereel. Only the knowledge that forbidding something made it all the sweeter kept him from outright confronting her about it. Instead he complained to Obi-Wan.<p>

The older Master smiled. "They're harmless enough, Anakin. Really, I think Mace could stand having his routine shaken up a little. It's good for him."

"What about the other things?" Anakin asked, prickly with displeasure, as he walked with Obi-Wan down the streets of Coruscant after a breakfast at Dex's Diner. "The lift doors jamming on Nuriin Vakuda and Zaran Sparr-"

"Those two could use a little forced alone time to sort out their differences."

"-all the towels gone missing in the 'fresher on level four-"

"It's lucky we don't enforce a nudity taboo, isn't it?"

"-that pepper bomb that exploded when Master Nu used the salt shaker yesterday-"

"She actually enjoyed that. Said it cleared her sinuses quite nicely." Anakin frowned down at Obi-Wan. "You don't seem to get it. I don't like them spending so much time together. It's not healthy."

Obi-Wan heaved a resigned sigh. "Here we go again."

"What do you mean, 'here we go'?"

Obi-Wan shook his head in fond exasperation. "Answer that question yourself. Why don't you like them together?"

Anakin shrugged, face heating up. "Mara's young and impulsive and a thrill-seeker and…"

Obi-Wan snapped his fingers. "That's it exactly. You, my friend, have an irrational fear that Mara will fall in love with every male she meets who's not in the Order. Remember your reaction when Vokara took the Padawans to meet Fib?"

Anakin sputtered. Obi-Wan steered him out of the way of oncoming foot traffic and into a sheltered alley. "I do not-!"

"Did your voice just crack?" Obi-Wan asked in bright interest.

Anakin scowled at him. "Very funny. And I do not. Mara and I have been on dozens of missions in the past two years, and I've never been scared she'd fall in love with any of our contacts."

"That's because you're there."

"I do not!"

Obi-Wan raised his eyebrows in confusion. "Anakin, that's not even a logical response."

Anakin resisted the urge to Force scream in frustration. With his miserable luck he'd blow Obi-Wan off the walkway. "She never listens," he muttered, or meant to mutter, but it came out sounding melancholy.

Obi-Wan tapped his nose gently. "Neither did you."

There was nothing Anakin wanted more than a hug right then. He had gotten out of the habit in the past few years, as the kids got older and less cuddly. Intertwining Force sense with another touched the heart intimately, it was true, and expressed all the love and affection more purely and clearly than any embrace, but he still longed for the physical expression, where you could feel warmth and heartbeat and breath on your ear and instinct's wishful thinking whispered that you were utterly safe. So he enfolded Obi-Wan in a spontaneous hug. Obi-Wan indulged him with an arm around his shoulders, then gently pushed him off. As he did, though, he delicately twined his Force sense with Anakin's like moving vines weaving together. Anakin closed his eyes and accepted this communion of the hearts. Outer silence ruled the moment, as it should. In this beautiful moment, he discovered his friend and Master all over again. He saw Obi-Wan as a golden wave on the ocean of the Force, a figure of light with a polished diamond at its heart… He was the first to withdraw. Among the Jedi, Obi-Wan-and-Anakin were the epitome of the Master-Padawan bond, even after all these years. Obi-Wan-and-Luke worked well together and complimented each other, but still they were a far cry from Obi-Wan-and-Anakin's perfect harmony. And as for Anakin-and-Mara-

"She doesn't even like me," he revealed unhappily. "Ferris said she would be good for me but- Our training bond feels like I'm twisting her arm behind her back. It's an unwilling closeness."

Obi-Wan eyed him sternly. "You are a good Master, Anakin. I have never doubted your abilities as a teacher, and neither should you. Remember, she doesn't have to like you to learn from you."

And that was supposed to make him feel better? He rolled his eyes skyward. "And I want a relationship with her like Qui-Gon had with Dooku? 'Grateful to learn from you, Master.' No, thank you. I want…what we have."

He came up short at the dancing amusement in Obi-Wan's clear eyes. He had the same look as someone who has traveled a difficult path, come to the top, seen the horizon, and laughs and laughs at the trials of the journey up. "Don't you remember the shouting matches? The fights? All the little hurtful things we did and said? You swore never to speak to me again eighteen times. You're both young, Anakin. Give it time. You'll grow together." He considered. "Just…tweak your technique a bit. Less lecturing and more hands-on should work. You know exactly how she's feeling, after all."

Obi-Wan was right. As usual. One of these days he was going to get tired of that…

Anakin heaved a sigh. "Okay. Still, about Mereel…"

Obi-Wan stepped out of the alley and they continued on their way. "If it really bothers you, take her away for a day of training or something." Anakin's eyes wandered the cityscape of Coruscant until they came to rest of the silver outline of the Senate Building. Perfect. "She could use some more diplomacy training. Maybe Chancellor Organa could give her a few lessons."

Obi-Wan closed his eyes with the beginnings of an apparent headache. "I beg of you, spare Bail the torment. And me too. If she gives him a hard time, the first thing he'll do is call me to grouse about it. Have mercy on me for once."

Method decided, Anakin cheered immediately. "Nope," he grinned with just the slightest childish bounce to his step. "I'm Lord Darth Vader, remember? 'Mercy' is not in my vocabulary."

Obi-Wan regarded him with narrowed eyes. "Sometimes, Anakin, I just want to forget my restraint and give you a good hard smack."

* * *

><p>Verp did not handle inordinate amounts of stress with grace. Its reception of the clones made it look like it had welcomed the Alcatraz escapees with tears of joy. To it, they seemed to be an army of towering fiends bent on its annihilation. Whenever one of them came into view, it froze as if paralyzed and keened for Mird.<p>

Mereel found it irritating. Why was it so scared of them? Sure, they were arguably super soldiers, probably the best in the galaxy, he acknowledged with heedless pride, but this was ridiculous. His every move struck terror into its heart.

A week and a half into their stay-eleven days until they went home-he dressed for breakfast, again in the white smock thing the healers had given him and a pair of slippers. Slippers! Even the Jedi wore boots.

He missed his armor. A thin layer of cloth was all that lay between an attacker and his skin. Too easy to plunge a saber through cloth and bone to stab a vital organ. He felt naked and vulnerable. _As soon as we get home, I'm getting myself a real set of armor_, he decided. _Proper _beskar'gam_, nothing cheap like durasteel. _He thought he'd dye it orange, which symbolized a lust for life. The last ten days had really filled him with the simple elation of living in the moment, with his family within shouting distance and the impish Mara as an apprentice at making mayhem. Only Skywalker had freaked out and whisked her off to parts unknown for the past two days, returning at sunset deadened to the world. _Yep_, he concluded. _Definitely spending time with politicians._

He wandered out of his room and into the hall, yawning widely and stretching his arms out to liven up the muscles. Verp, who had been attempting to slip past to reach Vau's door, let out a small wail and deflated like a collapsing circus tent. Mereel stared in shock and bewilderment at the puddle of wrinkles that was Mird's baby. A junior healer on his way to perform some chore also stared. Mereel looked slowly up at the ebony-skinned healer for an explanation.

He spoke slowly. "The closest feeling I can come to is…despair." Mereel gaped in astonishment. "But I yawned." That coaxed a tiny whimper from the deflated strill. Mereel could not wrap his mind around this gross overreaction. "_I yawned!_"

The healer smiled uncertainly and reached down to pick up the limp baby. "I'll get this out of your way." He carried it off to Vau's room.

Mereel swore in six different languages.

The situation only got worse when his brothers heard about it. Ordo strong-armed Jaing out of the chair next to Kal at breakfast and grinned at Mereel, who poked grumpily at his hotcake and waited for the first jibe to land. "_Shab_, Mereel. Driving a baby animal to despair is low even for you." Mereel threw his breakfast bun at Ordo's head. It grazed his ear and left flakes of frosting in his hair. "I yawned! That's all I did!"

Ordo dusted icing from his hair. "Must be something about your monstrous ugliness. _Manda_ knows you didn't inherit _Buir_'s good looks like I did."

Fi snorted. "You're the one who wants to buy a skirt when we get home."

Ordo rounded on him. "I told you, it's a _kama_. A unique garment of Mandalorian culture that only you feminine types are afraid to wear." Flushed, Fi opened his mouth to deliver a stinging retort that would probably send him to the Healing Halls with a broken jaw when Kal waved for them both to sit down and start eating. "Simmer down, boys. I wouldn't insult the females like that if I were you, _Ord'ika_. Bralor could laugh about it on Kamino, but in the wider galaxy they're the ones who are the most dangerous."

Indeed, they were receiving several piercing looks from female Knights who'd heard the exchange. Ordo's face flamed when he realized Besany had her arms crossed and her eyebrows raised in offense. The air in the vicinity chilled noticeably.

Kal patted his shoulder sympathetically as he ducked his head to avoid eye contact. "Just keep your head down, son. That's all you can do."

* * *

><p><strong>Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	17. Chapter 17 Venku of Mandalore

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 17: Venku of Mandalore<p>

Kad entered the comm room with slow, careful steps. Nameless dread fomented in his stomach. The leaden weight that had formed after he heard about Kyp and Quinlan Vos had stayed in the pit of his stomach, dragging him down for weeks.

On the holoprojector in the middle of the room stood a man he had known by sight for years. A frosty blue ghost, Vos stood life-sized before a small gathering of senior Jedi: Yoda, Mace Windu, Aayla Secura, Obi-Wan, and Anakin. The call from Vos had come while Master Che and Kad worked with Vau on strenuous exercises that left him chalk white and panting. The Council thought Kad deserved to hear this. Master Che volunteered to come, but Kad had assured her that Obi and Ani were enough. Really, he didn't want her there. He had no idea what might happen, when Vos might say, what he might say, what he might do. He felt as if he teetered at the edge of a slope that had opened suddenly beside his feet, in danger of sliding down it at any moment. But a part of him wanted to slide down it, and he had no idea what was at the bottom. Mandalore? The dark side? Satisfaction or closure or regret or bitterness?

Kad made himself lift his feet as he rounded the circular room until he was at Ani's side. His friend crouched down beside him.

"You all right?"

Kad shook his head. He touched his temple. "It feels-" And his heart, and his stomach. "-coiled tight, like something's going to break."

Anakin glanced away. The flickering blue light from the comm cast his features in a set-jawed profile with shadowed eyes. For the first time, Kad saw his beloved friend and mentor-his older brother, really-as someone who could have doubted badly enough to nearly fall to the dark side.

Fear coursed through him as he realized he understood the snaking tendrils of doubt, the souring contentment, the slow buildup of thoughts that could lead to treachery. It was not the Jedi he doubted, though. They were good and true, servants of peace and justice. Nor was it the Force, which sang through him even now, when he felt as if it should be severed. What was it? His choices? His life? His free will?

"Hold onto me," Ani whispered.

Kad nodded mutely and squeezed his friend's metal hand, the hand he had always preferred to hold, maybe because it reminded him of his uncles' hands sheathed in gauntlets, he realized now.

The door opened one last time and Aayla Secura rushed in. The Twi'lek Master bowed formally to Yoda. "I apologize for being late. I had to think."

Yoda nodded once gravely. Kad hadn't ever seen him this serious, not even when someone died. Death was such a little thing to a Jedi, though, a mere transformation. This…

Finally assembled, the Jedi gathered in view of the holorecorder, which would beam their image to Quinlan Vos far in the Outer Rim. Yoda and Windu presided from the center, Kad and his friends to one side, Aayla to the other.

Vos leaned forward in a bow that made Kad's hackles rise. "Masters." He glanced at Kad.

"Learn of how you found Kad Skir'ta, we have," Yoda said in a low dragon's voice. "Found in an asteroid prison, his family was. Implicate you, they did."

Vos jerked as if stung. His eyes flickered to Kad again. The boy felt like he had been branded.

"You attacked their apartment at night with a commando team," Mace Windu said slowly, each word drawn out. "The family was subdued and arrested. You found Kad in a crib in a back room, crying."

Vos winced but said nothing. His eyes couldn't settle, but flickered from Mace to Yoda to Aayla to Kad and Ani and Obi and back again.

"You brought him out. His uncle, Mereel, told you he had family on Mandalore and to send him there." Mace paused, then delivered the damning line. "You refused."

Vos clenched his jaw and stared at his boots.

"At your pleasure, Quinlan," Windu said sharply.

He looked up swiftly with bitter eyes. "I merely did what I thought was best," he growled. "Can any of you say different?" He blanched as he realized that those words were a mistake.

Aayla inserted herself quickly. "They don't blame you for the arrest, Quin," she soothed. "Chancellor's orders. That was a pit we all fell into." "We're here to address a potential kidnapping," Windu said inexorably. He refused to pull any punches or be sidetracked. "Your side of the story. Start with the child."

Vos struggled to find words. He rubbed the back of his neck and scowled at the ceiling, lips pulled back in a snarl. "I found a child, Force-sensitive and alone, and brought him to the one place where he would be safe, nurtured, and cherished. Is that such a crime?"

"It is if the parents had other wishes."

Aayla raised her hand. "Master Windu, if I may?"

Windu nodded reluctantly.

Kad knew a defense was forthcoming. He had always wondered how someone as nice as Master Secura could be friends with a being as abrasive and derogatory as Quinlan Vos.

"Master Yoda, I'd like to point out a few things. Master Vos did have a number of good reasons for doing what he did. The Jedi do have legal custody, of course, so he broke no laws-"

"Break no laws did you," Yoda agreed with a loud tap of his cane. "But _right_, was it? What you should have done, was it?" He waved for Aayla to go on.

She cleared her throat and shared a look with Vos, who stood with his hands in his sleeves and waited for her justifications to play out. "Master Vos had just helped arrest beings he was told were dangerous criminals. Whatever else these beings are, do you doubt that they have broken laws? Just laws that hold civilization together, and not just military codes?"

"They are criminals, yes," Windu acknowledged. "We will not be reporting them to the Senate due to the reality of their imprisonment…but that is not our current concern."

"How much right do arrested criminals have in determining the fate of a youngling? In Coruscanti courts, their parental rights are terminated for the period of their arrest." Aayla had been doing research.

Kad felt a twinge of dislike coil around his constricted heart. _They're criminals? Who says?_ But then it faded. Facts were facts, no matter how much he didn't want to hear them.

"Of course, legality doesn't equal morality. But please consider the circumstances. The Force was clouded worse than ever before. The family of this child had just been arrested for treason to the Republic we were fighting to hold together. The man who told him about the family on Mandalore was not the child's parent. We have never taken uncles' opinions into account."

Aayla glanced apologetically at Kad from under her eyelashes. He looked away, but listened harder.

"Mandalore…has never been a safe place for Force-sensitives. From the way Master Vos saw it, the child would have been in danger there. Not an enlightened view, perhaps… But where does he cross the line from misguided recruitment into kidnapping? I don't agree with what he did, Masters. I think he should have taken Kad to the Acquisition Division and let them decide what was the right thing-the Jedi thing-to do. But I do think the idea that he overstepped some clear-cut moral line is absurd. Morality is not clear-cut. From a certain point of view-" She nodded respectfully to Obi-Wan, who looked back, iron-faced. "-what Master Vos did was attempt to keep an orphaned child safe and give him a caring home. From another point of view-my point of view-it was wrong. It was a mistake. But that is all it was: a mistake. For my friend and former Master, I ask your forgiveness of this mistake." She bowed her head to await their judgment.

Kad clutched Anakin's hand in a death grip. The mechanical fingers squeezed back suddenly.

Kad felt a swell of self-loathing from Ani before dragged out the words, "Maybe she's right."

Everyone looked at him.

Vos looked shocked.

Obi-Wan looked appalled. "Anakin-"

"The Council was willing to forgive Dooku, if only he came back to us." Kad looked up at Ani, who glanced at him and looked away quickly. "And-" He stopped. Kad felt him bite his tongue hard enough to draw blood. "You forgave me for killing the Tusken Raiders. If you can forgive treachery and genocide-" He broke off and glared at Vos with undisguised revulsion. "Not that I want you to, mind you. Just thought you might like to take the _precedents_ into account." He spat a mouthful of blood onto the base of the holoprojector. The crimson droplets sailed through Vos's cyan feet and momentarily broke up the projection.

Windu turned ponderously to Yoda. "Master Yoda, your thoughts?" Yoda frowned deeply and tapped his gimer stick against the floor. "Wrong it was, Quinlan. Wrong the act was, even more wrong the _intent_." He looked from hooded eyes up at the distant Jedi. "Prejudiced against Mandalorians and the Fett clones, you are. Let your personal aversions affect your judgment, you did."

Vos took a deep breath. "They were traitors, Master Yoda. The commandos had orders to eliminate them. The way I saw it, their hold on the child was forfeit the minute they betrayed the Republic."

"So raise him as a guardian of the Republic, you would? To pay their debt, perhaps?" Yoda looked at Vos like he could see right through him to his heart, and through that too. His face wrinkled in an instant of contempt. "Think them unworthy of family, you did. Your call, that is not." He paused, as if he had found something particularly interesting. Vos fidgeted uncomfortably, like the old Master was picking at a scab. "But feel for him, you did, too. See yourself in him, you did: a child whose world has ended. Want to give him the home you found, you did." Yoda closed his eyes like he was blocking out an old pain. "Complicated, this matter is. Stay in the Outer Rim for now, you will. Return to us for judgment when the Skiratas leave, you must. A seed of compassion, you had. Clouded, the Force was. A new Padawan, you have just taken. In your favor, these things are." He rapped his stick sharply on the ground, and Vos jumped. "But separate a child from his family, you did. Act on anger and hate, you did. Black marks against you, these are." He crossed his three-fingered hands on his stick. "Think long on this, we will, whether a Jedi you can still be."

Vos clenched his teeth and bowed.

Windu turned to Kad. "We'll let you speak to him alone. Everything either of you says is off record." He motioned briskly for the others to leave. Anakin tensed, but Obi-Wan seized his arm. "It's his right," he whispered, and nodded to Kad. Kad tried to smile, but his cheeks didn't seem to feel like it. Obi-Wan looked so stony, like a grim statue, not the warm father figure he knew.

Anakin gave Kad a hug. "I'm sorry," he muttered thickly.

Kad squeezed him hard. "It's okay, Ani."

"No, it's not. You're my friend, my- I should stand up for you, should tell them to throw him out or-"

Kad shrugged and managed a weak smile. "I don't even know what I want."

"Skywalker!" Windu called. Obi-Wan gave Kad a one-armed hug and pulled Anakin from the room.

Aayla glanced worriedly at Vos on her way out, but as she passed, she whispered, "I'm so sorry, Kad."

Yoda was the last to leave. He came up and put a fortifying hand on Kad's forearm. "A strong heart, you have, Kad Skirata. Trust it, you must. Always save you, it will." He tapped away before Kad could say a word, the name _Kad Skirata_ ringing in his ears. The door closed behind the old green Jedi. The only sound was the static of the holoprojector, caused by solar flares between Coruscant and the faraway Outer Rim.

Kad clenched his fists, then released them. He didn't know what to think. He didn't know what to feel. Staring at the door, he asked, "Why?" Silence. Then, a harsh voice with a thin veneer of calm. "I already told you."

He wouldn't look at the speaker. He couldn't. "Tell me something else, then." Was that his voice? So tight and defiant, with a razor edge he didn't recognize.

"I have no idea what you want to hear. You'll have to be more specific."

A tremor ran through Kad from shoulders to knees. "Did you ever regret it? Did you ever think about what you'd stolen from me?" Hot words, twisted from his stomach, not his heart. A lump formed in his throat. His mind was strangely blank. He couldn't form pictures of anyone, not Jedi or Mandalorians, what had been or was, what might have been or could be. He was frozen like a flybuzz trapped in amber.

"I watched you. You seemed happy."

Shakes racked Kad's body. He trembled violently. "_Why?_ How could you do this?"

Vos spoke sharply. "Have you considered what would have happened if I _didn't_? Your clan would be dead, boy. It was only because of me that they're alive, and it was only because of you that I ordered them to be spared."

Kad didn't want to hear it. How could he think on such a thing? "Your life saved theirs."

The words hit him like blows to the gut. They were horrible, he hated them, but they were true. He closed his eyes against the prick of scalding tears. His life had no Sidious, no puppet master behind the curtain who orchestrated every bad event and laughed as he suffered. He almost envied Ani the clarity of that. Something clawed at his heart, and he didn't even know what. _What am I feeling? Why does this hurt so much?_

Vos might have read his mind. "Have you had such a bad life?"

Kad whirled to face him. The Kiffar Jedi had his arms crossed, looking at Kad and away again. His eyes couldn't settle. Kad read guilt there, but also conviction. "What about the Amidala twins? Kenobi? Skywalker? Che? Do you wish you'd never met them? Would you rather be Mandalorian than Jedi?"

Kad trembled. The primal edge of All Out threatened to spring to life in his limbs and turn him into a whirlwind of fury. "_That's not what this is about_," he spat. "This is about what you did, and why you did it."

Vos stared at the ceiling.

"_Look at me!_"

Vos flinched but looked at him.

Kad held his gaze with blazing, tear-filled eyes. "Why?" he whispered.

Vos stared back, hands shaking slightly until he clenched them firmly together. "Because I thought it was best," he snapped. "Because your family was about to die, you were alone, you were special and gifted and deserved a better life than anything they could have given you. Because they had betrayed the Republic and didn't merit a say in your life. Because you reminded me of myself. Because you were the only innocent and shouldn't have had to suffer for their choices. I have so many answers, and not one of them's the one you want to hear. You want me to say I did it to hurt you. To make them suffer. Because I hated them, or I hated you. Well, I won't, because that wasn't why. You have no idea what it was like then. No one could see. The Force was drowning us even as we called upon it to stay afloat." He gritted his teeth and looked away. "I thought I was doing the right thing. I've watched you ever since. You were happy and powerful, a credit to the Jedi, and a fitting legacy for your clan."

Kad stared at him, trembling. "I should hate you," he whispered in a raw voice.

Vos shook his head with the hint of a humorless smile, as if they were staring a morbid joke. "But you don't. You want to, but you can't."

A heavy silence fell. Kad dropped heavily to a crouch and panted as the shakes gripped his body.

Vos reached for the switch that would end the transmission. "I do wish-" he hesitated, them slapped the button and crackled out of existence.

* * *

><p>Kad sat in a windowsill in a secluded corner of the Temple, forehead against the hot transparisteel. Yellow sunlight poured through until his black hair was warm to the touch. This was his secret place that only Luke and Leia knew about. A private place, where he could go just to be alone. The statue of a broad-chested Nikto Master overlapped the sill enough to hide him from all but a vigilant observer. Anyone who sensed him would know to leave him alone.<p>

He felt numb. Ice lined his veins, joining the lead in his stomach. His skin felt hot, but he was so cold.

Someone hesitantly cleared their throat. Kad peered out from behind the statue to see Darman, his father, standing a few meters away down the hall. They were alone. "Are you all right?" the clone asked.

Kad blinked. "Did you follow me?" He couldn't think of how else Darman would know about this place.

The ex-commando nodded in embarrassment. "You looked so upset that I- Do you need anything? Do you want to talk?"

Kad shook his head. "No. No, I really, really don't."

Silence fell again. Darman felt awkward and looked over Kad's head, searching for more words. Kad could only think of how young he looked. He was a vigorous twenty-seven physically, much too young to be the father of a twelve-year-old. But that was what stasis did. It jerked you out of time and left your life disjointed and surreal when you finally returned.

At last Darman looked down at him. "Do you want to spar?" he asked hopefully. "Just hand-to-hand. No weapons."

Kad didn't _feel_ like doing anything. He didn't feel anything, truthfully. _But if I feel nothing, then why not_, he reflected, and so he slipped out of his hiding place. "Sure."

Darman grinned tentatively. "You go easy on me with the Force, and I'll go easy on you with size."

Kad looked up at his father and realized the top of his head didn't reach Darman's chin. A flicker of interest lit in his chest. What could a clone teach him that a Jedi couldn't? He shed his over-robe and settled into a fighting stance. "Your move."

Darman scrutinized him, then in a flash came at him with a knife hand strike to the neck. Kad sprang away, out of reach. The air whistled as the missed blow passed within a centimeter of hitting. Darman gave him no time to recover and came at him again. Again Kad narrowly evaded. He slipped out of the clone's reach every time, but just barely. The first few seconds passed in a quick dance of attack and evasion as Kad assessed Darman's tactics. He knew Darman was doing the same with him.

Darman Skirata went right for the kill, and he put intent into the speed and force of his hits. Kad could guess the combative strengths of the clones as opposed to the Jedi. For Jedi, the most important part of hand-to-hand was the transition between movements, the fluidity that opened them more clearly to the currents of the Force. This focus, called Jedi Flow, lent their fighting unity and a lethal grace. The clones, on the other hand, lived in a world of practicality. Their training and fighting bore in mind only the more efficient and effective way to get the job done. They shamelessly exploited weaknesses and possessed greater drive to kill or be killed.

_More willing to kill? Less afraid to?_ A good or a bad thing? Or just different?

Kad weaved around Darman in an evasive dance, always just a fraction of a second ahead of him, when Darman's punch abruptly changed direction and clipped his jaw hard enough to snap his head around. Kad stumbled, and Darman twisted him into an armlock. The pressure he put was firm enough to cause some pain, but not hard enough to actually wound. Kad admired that control, especially in someone without a healer's empathy. "Surrender," Darman panted. Kad went limp. Darman's hold stayed tight. "Not going to work. Surrender."

"Okay." Kad jammed his heel against a pressure point on Darman's foot. The clone swore and released his grip just enough for Kad to wiggle out of his grasp and spin to face him. Kad pressed his second's advantage with a kick at the gut. Darman ducked and rolled out of the way and came up in time to parry another thrust. Their battle wore on, variously offensive and defensive. When Darman lunged and grabbed Kad's arm, Kad used the man's momentum against him and flipped him over his shoulder, much to Darman's breathless surprise and delight. Kad found something to admire in Darman's self-awareness and control.

The match ended in a grapple on the floor, until Darman managed to pin the boy under him. "Surrender now," he panted.

Kad tried shifting and realized he was thoroughly immobilized. "I surrender," he gasped.

Darman rolled off him. They lay side by side, staring at the ceiling as they waited for their breathing to even out. "That was amazing," Darman said appreciatively after a minute. "You were so fast I could barely touch you."

"You had more self-awareness than I thought a non-Force-sensitive could have."

Darman laughed. "Is that a word, really? Why not just be honest and call us Force-obtuse?"

"Because you're normal. We're the weird ones."

Darman chuckled. "I guess all that self-awareness could come from Kamino. Surrounded by people who look exactly like you—it has a way of making you pay special attention to your differences. Or maybe it was just _Kal'buir_'s training."

Kad pillowed his arms behind his head and said, "Tell me about Kamino." Darman was silent for a while, then began to talk. Kad listened to the story of his father's life quietly. Much of it he had heard from Kal, though Darman put a different spin on it. Kal's had been more emotional and evocative, while Darman summed it up evenly. The only time he paused was when he lingered on his dead wife, Etain. "And that's about it," Darman finished dismissively after less than half an hour.

Kad sat up and stared at him. "That's not it. You have your whole life ahead of you."

Darman smiled sadly. "_Vencuyot_. It translates roughly as, 'good future.' That's what we thought we had right before the arrest." He stared at the ceiling for a while. "That was your name when you were born: Venku. _Buir _named you, but when I said I would name a son Kad, they changed it. Still called you Venku publicly, but in private you were always _Kad'ika_." He spoke so softly, like he was talking about good times long lost.

Kad leaned over Darman. "Listen to me. You still have a good future. Maybe not the one you planned for or hoped for, but you still have one. You can make one." He paused. "I feel you still have a _vencuyot. _The Force isn't wrong about these things…_Buir_."

Darman smiled at him with such a dawning joy that tears prickled in Kad's eyes again, only these were bittersweet, not just cold and empty.

He grinned and joked, "You know I could have beaten you with my supernatural powers any time I wanted to, right?" Generally he didn't engage in banter like this, but the time felt right, and it seemed the thing that would make Darman the most happy.

Darman sat up until his nose was two centimeters from Kad's. "Not before I flattened you with a body slam. Would you show me that move you did again? The one with the nerve-pincers at my wrist and elbow?"

"The Juzzian armlock. See…" Kad gently put the hold on Darman and manipulated the nerves enough that he felt twinges of discomfort.

"I've never seen that before."

"Jedi move. What about that strike to my clavicle?"

Darman jumped up and waved him forward. "Let me show you again, then let's see if I can get this Juzzian armlock thing right."

Smiling, Kad relaxed his stance and waited for his father to come at him again.

* * *

><p>Master Che knocked on Obi-Wan's door. It slid open.<p>

The Council Master sat on one of the pads. "Vokara," he welcomed in the remote, dreamy voice of someone immersed in the Force. Master Che waited impatiently for him to draw himself out of it. Disturbing someone in the depths of meditation could cause splitting headaches and disorientation if they were jolted violently out of it. At last he opened his eyes and smiled so guilelessly at her that she shook her head in wonder. "For someone with such responsibility, you are a remarkably serene person."

He canted his head. "What responsibility?"

She stared at him. "The Council. Missions. A Padawan. A needy, overbearing former Padawan and _his_ Padawan. Said present Padawan's imp of a sister. Mace Windu, when he wants to talk to someone with a clear head. _My_ Padawan. Speaking of which, where is he?"

Obi-Wan made a face. "When you put it that way, I sound unfairly overworked. Kad is with Darman, I think."

"Oh." Master Che's stomach flipped.

"Is something wrong?"

She sighed and sat down on the other pad. "I've barely seen him all week. He only ever shows up to help me with Kal's physical therapy, and then he's off again. And that one duel, but that was only because his uncles wanted to see his skill with a lightsaber."

Obi-Wan shrugged. "He's exploring a whole different world, Vokara, one that was his by birthright. It's only to be expected that he'd get caught up in it. Don't take it personally."

She fingered the hem of her robe. "But that's what I'm worried about. They're leaving tomorrow. What if-" She stopped, then started again. "What if he wants to go with them? Something about it calls to him, I know."

Obi-Wan lowered his eyes, then looked up again. "If he wants to leave, it's his choice. He's old enough to make that decision for himself. Frankly, I can see the appeal. A family he's never known but loves him unreservedly, a life that offers all the adventure of a Jedi's without the restraints, a culture known to be infectious for those of a certain temperament. Healing for the wound inflicted by what happened to him. A chance to make these people so very happy. It holds real appeal, Vokara." Master Che blinked tears from her eyes. "But I don't want him to go." She realized how childish and selfish that sounded and snorted. "Typical. There goes attachment again, clouding my sights. I never really had trouble with it before, but now…" She looked up. "Do you want him to go?"

Obi-Wan shook his head. "Of course not. Who doesn't want their loved ones always close, always with them? I certainly didn't want Anakin to leave when the Council-" He broke off.

Master Che sensed a sensitive topic there, for both Anakin and Obi-Wan, but decided not to press him. She sighed, and found her nose was running. "Stang."

Obi-Wan solemnly handed her a handkerchief.

She blew her nose and stuck it in her pocket. "I'll get it cleaned for you."

He shrugged. "It's not mine. The cleaning droids just left it in the pocket."

She laughed thickly, then snorted and blew her nose again. "You know what? I'm actually going to miss those annoying Nulls too."

* * *

><p>Kad shot down the hall to the Skirata lounge, Luke and Leia hot on his heels.<p>

"Hey, wait up!" Mara called from the end of the hall.

They slowed down only fractionally for her before they burst into the room. All of Clan Skirata was there, as well as their invited guests: Anakin, Obi-Wan, Master Che, and Ferris.

Mereel seized Kad by his collar and tugged him out of the way, then shoved Luke into Leia. They stumbled and collapsed in a heap on the other side of the door.

"Hey-" Leia began.

Mereel held a finger to his lips and winked conspiratorially at R2-D2, who waddled to lurk right in front of the door. It zipped open. Mara stepped inside, and R2 let loose with an explosion of confetti and a tremendous whoop from his sound effects system. Mara shrieked and jumped clear across the hall.

Mereel stuck his head out of the room with a grin. "Happy Farewell Day, Snips. Thanks for the party."

Mara had her back pressed against the wall, a look of indignant alarm still frozen on her face. "What party? I thought it was just a goodbye thing." "Of course!" Mereel crowed. Mara stared in disbelief at the neon orange party hat he was wearing. Mereel shrugged. "Fi though we'd add some color to the thing. Mando parties don't generally look like this. Trust me. Come on, you're the last one." He grabbed her and dragged her inside. The room was a riot of confetti. R2, the DJ and decorator, spat out another cloud of it every so often. A small table held a few appetizers as well as a punch bowl of some clear liquid that Darman had a glass of and was sipping experimentally.

As Kad headed for him, he sneezed and wrinkled his nose. "Is this fizzy juice?"

Kad shrugged. "Jedi don't drink."

Darman lit up when he saw Kad. "Well, neither do clones," he laughed, sounding a little relieved. "Or at least, I never have. I'm sort of nervous about the first time, to be honest. _Buir_ has quite a horror story about the one and only time he got drunk."

Little conversations and debates occupied everyone in the room. The atmosphere was festive, with random spouts of confetti from R2 and a lively, rippling background music. Bursts of laughter came from Mereel and Mara, while Anakin hovered nearby until Obi-Wan shooed him away. Most of the clones made regular trips by the buffet table and complained loudly when their favorite dish was depleted. Mird trotted the room like it was the hostess and snuffled up at everyone inquiringly, Verp scampering excitedly at its heels. The baby strill had finally overcome its fear when one of the Nulls caught it and puffed vigorously into its nostrils-though it was still skittish around Mereel. Leia and Luke got into an arm wrestling contest with Corr and, together against him, managed to win a few games. When R2 began to play songs instead of just background music, Vau shocked everyone by standing up and giving a flamboyant baritone rendition of a slow-paced love song, then mocked Kal for half an hour about doing a duet with him. Fi made everyone sit down for a room-by-room tour of a 3D map of Kyrimorut he had designed over the last three weeks. The bastion-home consisted of an interlocking series of circular rooms. Fi had assigned everyone one that would suit their needs.

"And that's for any kids who happen to come along," he finished, waggling his eyebrows in Besany and Ordo's direction.

Kad sat on the floor at Darman's feet. Darman put a hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "It looks like a great place," he whispered. "I've never been there personally, but you were born there."

"Wow," Kad muttered.

The idea of actually being where he was born, walking halls where he had spent his first days of life, both attracted and repelled him. Those hallways had been empty for years, and must have felt haunted to Fi. But now, if he walked them, he suspected it would be a happy haunting.

R2 wheedled enthusiastically and began to play fast-paced dancing music.

"Yahoo!" Mereel whooped, grabbed Niner, and pulled him out onto the floor. Niner, who was quiet and liked not to attract attention to himself, tried in vain to extricate himself from his brother's grip as they spun around the room. Ordo and Besany and Atin and Laseema shortly joined them in an ecstasy of laughter and tripping. Obi-Wan bowed gallantly to Mara, and they spun onto the dance floor. Leia grabbed Luke and dragged him out. Master Che approached Darman and bowed. "May I have this dance?" she asked, looked up with a conspiratorial half-smile.

Darman mouthed wordlessly.

Kad nudged him. "Go on, _Buir_."

Something flickered in Master Che's eyes, but she still smiled encouragingly. "I won't bite. Don't worry. We have dancing classes at the Temple. I'm quite good."

Darman mumbled and blushed. "I've never danced."

She held out her hands. "All the more reason to learn. This is a good one. Come. I insist." He shyly took her hand, and she drew him into a swift circular pivot. Everyone who wasn't dancing clapped to keep time. The dancers whirled by in a laughing blur. Kad loved it. The music ended too soon.

Mereel called, "Come on, another one!" while Niner yanked to free his hands from the Null's viselike grip.

R2 complied with a low, unhurried tune that was confidential if not romantic. A quick shuffling of pairs resulted. Ordo sidelined himself so Besany could dance with Kal. After Luke escaped, Leia turned to Anakin, who teared up and nodded mutely. Mereel passed a frustrated Niner off to Fi so he could dance with Mara, who seemed surprised and pleased and even a little embarrassed. Even Ferris appeared and managed to coax Luke into a round.

Kad was prepared to sit this one out to when Master Che came up and reached out a hand for him. "May I?"

He scrambled to his feet. "Of course, Master."

She smiled softly and guided him onto the floor. She put one hand on his shoulder and the other on his proffered hand, while he rested his free hand on her waist. Light-footed, they drifted around the room.

"They're good people," the Twi'lek murmured. "I'm going to miss them. They brought a bit of spontaneity we don't really have here. Liveliness, really. I think the difference between us and them is that we let the currents of life carry us, no resistance, no doubt. They grapple with them."

"Do you think that's wrong?" he asked, looking up at her, noting the fine lines around her eyes and how tired they looked, but calm now. The dance was a restful sleep. "The path to the dark side?"

She shook her head. "It has a merit, that form of living. It is full and rich and stems from love. Of course, it is also easily turned astray. Love of excitement and passionate romance becomes love of battle and lust, then love of carnage and cruel control very easily, sometimes. It's a dangerous life, but it's one they choose. They decide their own destinies." She shrugged.

He nearly countered her with some of Kal's reasoning, but caught himself. Now was not the time for philosophical discussions. Anyway, he really wasn't sure what his opinion was on the subject. He leaned his forehead against her shoulder and let himself be caught up in the gentle swirl of the dance. As they circled past Darman, he saw tears running freely down his father's cheeks as he watched with a wistful smile. The music petered to a stop. Quieter now, everyone moved about the room, engaged in small conversations, picked over the remains of the appetizers.

Kad returned to his place at Darman's feet. "Were you thinking of my mother?"

Darman heaved a shaky sigh. "I still can't believe it sometimes. It's even worse now that she's eleven years dead." He blinked more tears from his eyes. "_Shab_, I miss her."

Kad leaned against his leg in silent support. Darman unconsciously ruffled his hair.

The six Nulls were deep in discussion. A'den had finally recovered two days ago, but this was the first time Kad had seen them all in one room. Clustered together with their backs to everyone else in an intense debate, they struck him as a pack, like-minded and singularly unstable. His head spun as he remembered Kal's mentioning that the Kaminoans had tried to produce _twelve_ of them. He didn't think even Kal could have handled that many.

The matter decided, Ordo turned and clapped his hands. "This won't be a proper Mando party without a little Mando music. Time for _Dha Werda_. I know Fi's the only one with armor still, but we'll make do. Anyone in?" Kal started to stand up, his movements still ginger after the previous day's breaking and healing session to fix his knee.

"Except _Buir_," Ordo amended loudly.

Kal squinted at him, the corners of his mouth turned down in annoyance. "I'm not a cripple and I'm not terminal, son. As long as you don't sock me in the nose, I should come out with nothing more than a few healthy bruises."

"You're too old, _Buir_. You're seventy-one. That's old." He rounded on Master Che in a fit of agitation. "How much longer could he live, anyway?"

She closed her eyes in consideration. "Realistically? Twenty, thirty years. _If_ he takes good care of himself, which means no more mercenary jobs."

Ordo snorted harshly. "Trust me, I don't think any of us are going to want to leave Mandalore for a long, long time." He wheeled to face Kal. "You heard her! Please, _Buir_."

Kal sighed but resigned himself. "Fine. I'll translate for the _aruetiise_."

All the clones wanted to take part, as well as Jusik. They lined up in the center of the floor, while everyone else retreated to the borders of the room. Luke and Leia plopped down beside Kad.

"This should be interesting, if the song requires armor," Leia said with a grin.

Luke shook his head. "Trust Mandalorians to turn even a song into a military event."

Leia elbowed him. "Come on, even you have to admit that song Kal sang was exhilarating."

"And intoxicating," Luke said stubbornly. "That's why I'm not sure I like it. It feels dangerous, like they've given in to bloodlust."

"You worry too much."

"Someone has to."

"Hush," Kad hissed, ready to move if his friends didn't stop squabbling. The song had begun. The men chanted in a regular martial rhythm, fast and intense. Kad didn't understand the words, but Kal translated aloud for everyone.

"The ash of the Taung beats strong within the Mandalorians' heart.

We are the rage of the Warriors of the Shadow,

The first noble sons of Mandalore.

Let all those who stand before us light the night sky in flame.

Our vengeance burns brighter still.

The gauntlet of Mandalore strikes without mercy.

We are the rage of the Warriors of the Shadow,

The first noble sons of Mandalore.

Let all those who stand before us light the night sky in flame.

Our vengeance burns brighter still."

As they sang, they beat out a complex rhythm on one another's backs, turned in unison, and continued the rhythm. Every movement coordinated brilliantly with the others. The harmony it bespoke impressed Kad, but the trust took his breath away. One wrong move and someone would wind up with a bloody nose or a black eye. And yet still they drummed on, heedless of the risk, living only for the rhythm they and their comrades created. Kal tapped out the sequence in the air in front of him. Vau nodded along, jerking his head when a turn came. Laseema and Besany watched with the intensity of memorization. Mird crooned along, actually hitting some of the notes right, while Verp peered nervously from under its folds.

Kad's heart rose in him as he watched. _One._ The Mandalorians swiftly turned and pounded on, faces uniformly focused, eyes sharp with the power of the experience. _The wrath of Mandalore, Brothers All._ Their chanting grew to deafening shouts, deep and tribal. _The first noble sons of Mandalore._

Shadows flickered at the corners of Kad's eyes, silhouettes of slashing vulpine figures with sabers like teeth whirling through the dance of war. These, his ancestral memory, darted like wild beings through his mind's eye as he listened to the song, hypnotized. He saw beings fight with the ecstasy of complete release, a dropping of inhibitions that let out the genius of combat. He saw homes filled with laughing family members who bruised one another in training and in honest-to-Force fights, who made up with bone crushing hugs and affectionate mockery that left everyone bristling and inwardly smiling. He saw sons reared to adulthood by fathers who guided them down the path of their lives with a steady hand on their shoulders and invigorating words in their ears. He saw a simple life, of fighting and family, and wondered in bewilderment why anyone would ever want more.

The chant rushed on. _This could have been mine._ Fire instead of ice edged his veins, a burning rush of wild abandon he vicariously felt through the song his uncles sang. _It still could be._ The thought whispered like an oracle in his mind. _I could go with them, back to Mandalore. What could have been-me raised there by Darman and Kal-it still could be. I could go._ His heart raced. He had almost been Venku of Mandalore. He could be still.

The song ended. The audience clapped. Kad nearly jumped out of his skin as the sound broke him out of his reverie. He stared around at his uncles congratulating one another on a job well done, Master Che issuing orders for the invalids to head to bed, the other Masters shooing Padawans toward the door. His heart stilled.

Darman came up to him, dripping sweat, a joyous grin on his face that faded slowly, but still twinkled in his eyes. He offered a hand to help Kad up, which he took. "We're leaving first thing tomorrow," the clone reported happily. Then he stopped. "Are you coming with us?"

The room quieted. Kad looked around. Everyone was watching him, from the Jedi by the door to the Mandos grouped around the refreshment table. Darman looked at him with nervous hope. Master Che watched, close-faced, but he knew her better than that. She felt tensed inside, brittle. And Kal watching him with painful apprehension, Vau with his arms crossed, ready to make a judgment, Laseema urgent, his uncles impatient and tense. And R2 wheedling in confusion, Ferris worried, Obi-Wan open to come-what-may, Anakin dismayed, Mara utterly shocked. And Luke and Leia, so quiet.

The silence pressed down on him, grinding away at his mind. In desperation he breathed himself into a Jedi's still center. Calm now, he said, "I have to think."

Silence again.

"All right, then," Kal agreed, and held his arms out for a hug.

Kad embraced every member of Clan Skirata, even Mird and Verp. "Good night. I'll see you in the morning." He pressed his face into Darman's shoulder.

"It'll be all right, _Kad'ika_," he soothed.

"Bed," Master Che told the invalids sternly. "Now."

The Mandalorians drifted off to their rooms. The Jedi silently left the Healing Halls and walked until they stood in a dark hall lined with Padawan bedrooms.

Obi-Wan smiled sadly at Kad. "May the Force be with you tonight." "And you," he returned automatically.

Anakin dropped down and hugged him hard. "Whatever makes you happy," he whispered in the boy's ear. Ferris purred in reassurance, then was gone.

Kad turned to Luke and Leia. The twins said nothing, only looped him in a dual Force touch that left him warm at his center. They quietly slipped off to their rooms. He wondered if they already knew what choice he was going to make.

Mara hesitated. "'night."

"'night," Kad answered. She went to her door, waved it open, and looked over her shoulder at him. "Sleep well."

Kad knew this was going to be a sleepless night. The door closed, and he and Master Che were alone. She breathed slowly in through her nose, then rested a hand on his shoulder. She held it there, unable to say a word, then managed, "If you need any help, Padawan, we can meditate together. I could fetch Yoda. Perhaps a discussion."

Kad shook his head. "This is something I need to decide alone, Master," he answered quietly.

She winced, nodded, and strode briskly toward the lift that would take her to the Master's level. Her hand hovered over the button. Suddenly she turned around, sprinted back to him, and hugged him to her. "You are a wonderful, beautiful person, Kad. I love you. I want you to know that."

Kad blinked back surprised tears. "I love you too, Master."

She pulled back and smiled down at him. "I'm here if you need me."

He nodded. "I know."

Recognizing a request for solitude, she left him. Kad stood in the hallway for a long time, eyes on the sealed door of the lift. His fingers closed on his lightsaber. He stroked its hilt with his thumb, then his hands dropped to his sides. He began a slow pace down the hall, knowing there would be no sleep for him on this night.

* * *

><p><strong>Sorry it's so long. Please review.<strong>

**mad'ika**


	18. Chapter 18 Life's Crucible

**I do not own Star Wars.**

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><p>Ch. 18: Life's Crucible<p>

Crossing points. Times when a decision must be made and cannot be taken back. They are vital in battle, pivotal in love, the crucibles of life where an ultimate path is formed. They are relentless and demand a final answer, a true reckoning of who you are and who you will be. _Do this or do that. Be this or be that. But decide. Choose!_

And yet, while they are adamant, they are not merciless. Sometimes a time is given, just a time. A magical, in-between time where the future is open, and you can be anything, anyone. These quiet, peaceful times allow rest and reflection. But once they are over, you must be ready. You must make a choice.

* * *

><p>Master Che lay on her pallet for a long time without falling asleep. While she remained wide awake, her thoughts circled back to Kad, no matter how she tried to divert them. Back in the lounge, his eyes took on a faraway, feverish glint, as if he had fallen into a vastly different world already. A stranger's eyes. <em>I want what's best for him. I do.<em> She gazed with glazed eyes at the shifting colors her illuminator threw on her wall. Yellows and golds to green, blue, purple, red. As it hazed into orange, her heavy eyes closed, and she sank into sleep.

* * *

><p><em>She heads into the lobby of the apartment building and turns her head slowly, searching. She spots a tall, muscular man with shorn black hair and a short goatee and approaches him. "I'm looking for Fib. My sources tell me he boarded here?" <em>

_The man looks surprised and unsure. He straightens automatically into a salute, but loosens as consternation crosses his face. "I don't know, sir." The clone is wearing civilian clothes, plain gray garments that speak of a taste for the military life. "You'll have to give me his number, sir." _

_She sighs but calls the information up on her datapad on the database of clone soldiers that is hours from being wiped. "CT-5991/2787." The clone nods shortly. "This way." _

_She falls into step beside him, studies the stiffness in his shoulders, almost as if he feels betrayed. "And your name?" _

"_Reeve, sir." _

"_I'm Master Vokara Che. If you would call me Master Jedi instead of sir, I would appreciate it." _

_The clone nods, almost angry. _

"_Is something wrong?" _

_He looks away. "The GAR is our life, Master Jedi. Serving the Republic means everything. And you're taking that away." _

_She stops walking and stares at him. _

"_Everything that makes us important, everything that makes us special, everything that matters is the army, and you disbanded the army." _

_She sees that he clutches the strap of a bag over his shoulder. "And where are you going?" _

_He looks away resentfully. "College on Corellia. I'll take the four years of college you required, wait around until I can reenlist. Basically my life's on hold until I can get back to doing what I'm meant to be doing." He glares at her. _

_She tilts her head quizzically. She can't believe this attitude. "Is serving in the Republic military really the only thing you want to do with your life?" _

_He straightens; resolve flashes in his eyes. "It's the only thing worth living for." _

_To her surprise, she is sad. "I hope that's not what you always think," she tells him. Now he is surprised, blinking in confusion at her momentary bleakness. She puts a hand on his shoulder. "You have a chance at a real life now. Try not to waste it." _

_He pulls away. Since she is no longer military, she commands no respect. _

_A flicker in the Force catches her attention. "Thank you for helping me. I can find my way from here." She leaves bitter Reeve where he is and knocks on a door several meters down. Hopefully the one she has come to see will be more open. _

"_Come in," calls a voice that sounds disgruntled and rude, though she knows that is only how the speaker talks. She waves the door open and sees the clone, his back to the door, tense, like something has whispered just below his threshold of hearing. A mop of longish hair, red as a shout, shocks the eye at first sight. He still wears his gray fatigues and has an army-issued medical bag slung over one shoulder. His small apartment, containing a bedroom, living room, bathroom, and small kitchen, are bare of personal effects. Everything looks sharp and not lived in. So these quarters are yet another camp he is just passing through. _

_He turns slowly and looks her up and down quickly, in an automatic scan that quickens her blood with excitement. _A healer does such things._ She always picks out the most intuitive healers among her classes by observing which ones look for injury as soon as someone enters a room. "You again." He does not salute or stand at attention, which pleases her. _

An independent mind, this one.

"_May I come in?" _

_He shrugs like he just doesn't care. She crosses the threshold and sinks onto one of the chairs. He watches her, wary as he always is around Jedi since he found out what he is. A Force-sensitive clone. What a paradox. She smiles reassuringly at him. He is unconvinced. She waves a hand at him. "Please, Fib. Join me." _

_He sits on the hassock that goes with the chair she has selected and watches her. "What do you want?" _

_Her hand snakes into her pocket and touches the flimsi. Withdrawing it, she holds it out to him. "You are too old to be a Jedi." The words stick in her throat. "So I wrote you this." He takes it with a skeptical glance that tells her it might be poisonous for all he knows. She continues in a businesslike tone, "It is a letter of recommendation for admittance to Rhinnal State." _

_Even a clone has heard of that prestigious school. It is the best medical academy in the galaxy, and almost as hard to get into as the Jedi Order. _

"_Don't I need connections galore or money coming out my nose to get into that place?" he asks sardonically. _

_She taps the letter. "A letter from the Master Healer of the Jedi Order should do it. I already sent a copy. This is for you, to prove you're the real thing." _

_He rips open the envelope and pulls out the letter. _

_She remembers something else. "Do you have a last name?" _

_He looks up, startled. The movement stirs his hair, drawing her attention again. Why does he have such obnoxiously colored hair? He is not an exhibitionist, but a loner. "Why would I have a last name?" _

_She looks back at him, almost smiling at the surprised, vaguely derisive tone. _Lively. Good._ "Most beings have them. It will make them take you more seriously there. They must think of you as a colleague, not just a clone taking advantage of a bureaucrat's pity party." She scowls as she recites Senator Hooskanoonan's tirade against the recently passed Military Dissolution Act. _That clown in politician's clothing had better watch out, or he'll be due for a short and sudden meeting with a lightsaber, just like Palpatine was!_ With difficulty she steers herself away from those thoughts. The Chancellor's true identity is now widely known, thanks to a recording of his confrontation with the Council, including kindly old Palpatine slaying three Jedi Masters in cold blood. The wound that left in the Republic, the clones, and the Jedi still gapes. _

_She fixes Fib with her sternest stare. "I suggest you take one. Doctor…" _

_He shrugs. _

"_Then I shall give you one." _

"_All right, all right! You sure are pushy." He thinks. "Seven." "Seven?" _

_Now he crosses his arms defensively. "It's the last number of my serial. I'm used to it." _

_She shakes her head. "That won't do. Fib Seven sounds like your one of a series of droids." She tinkers with it in her head, substituting various letters until she arrives at an impressive-sounding moniker. "Severn. Fib Severn." _

_He tests it out with a notable lack of enthusiasm. "Only if you want it, of course," she amends quickly, remembering that these men are no longer the Jedi's or the Senate's to order around. If he was her Padawan it would be a different matter, but he is not. _

_He nods sharply. "Fine." _

_Her work is finished. She should go back to the Temple, where everyone is running their legs off trying to put the Republic back together. Everyone is so overworked that several Masters have gone catatonic. They need her help. But she resists. _Not yet.

_He reads the letter. A flush creeps into his cheeks. "But you barely know me." He brandishes the flimsi. "You can't just give a glowing recommendation to someone you've never seen work. It's unprofessional, not to mention stupid." _

_She shakes her head. "I feel you in the Force. That's enough. Your potential is enormous. Given the right training…" _

_But he will never get it. Only with the Jedi out of all the galaxy could he rise to his highest potential, and they will not have him. Regret scorches through her. _

_With a feeling like an epiphany, she slams her hand against the edge of a nearby table and breaks two fingers._

_He shouts in alarm. "Are you crazy?" _

_She probes her fingers, feels the blistering pain of the fractured bones, and inwardly rebukes herself for giving in to her morbid curiosity. She has no right to awaken his Force powers and leave him adrift. But she has to know for sure what she is missing._ Masochism_, she thinks wryly._ One of my many flaws._ She thrusts her twisted hand out to him. "Go on. Heal me." _

_He looks like he isn't sure whether to comply or run from the room and call security. "You're insane," he snaps, even as he reaches for her hand, the motion more subconscious than decided. He caresses the skin as he reaches for his medic bag. _

_She stops him. "No painkillers, and no splints. Just heal me." _

_He scowls at her. Then the glare slips from his face and unassuming focus replaces it. He cradles her broken hand and gently runs his fingers over the bones. She observes his actions through the Force and delights in the instinctive accuracy, how he naturally knits the bones together and dulls the pain. He works clumsily, like someone who has lived his whole life in the dark and has only just been given a lamp to see with. Still, his potential dazzles. _

_He comes to himself with a start. "That's all I can do." _

_The bone has not healed entirely, but he has eased the break until the damage is minimal. She heals the last fractures with a warm surge of the Force, but her attention is on the scowling clone. _

"_I don't want it," he says abruptly. "I never asked for it." _

"_And I did?" He falls silent, realizing the pointlessness of the discussion. _

_She senses the Force in him, a luminous echo that silhouettes his every move. Properly trained, that whisper could become a thunderclap. It is agony, to discover such a promising healer and for him to be forever out of reach. This is the Padawan she always said she would take, if she ever found one strong enough to suit her. She knows she is vain about her healing power, but sees nothing wrong with accurate self-assessment-another vanity, so Caudle says drolly. But to find the student of her dreams, and leave his gifts fallow because he is too old? Her hands itch with the desire to claw at Mace Windu until he stops being a conformist idiot and sees sense. _

_She plunges her hand into her robes and pulls out her healing crystal. "This is for you." She holds the faceted green stone toward him. _

_His eyes widen as he holds it up to a shaft of light. The crystal is the green of the heart of springtime, tinted with just enough yellow to give it a warm glow. "This was Grayson's favorite color," he whispers, the color drained from his face as he stares at it, stricken and awestruck. She has heard tell of the brother he could not save, told her by his previous general. "It will help you heal." _

"_But I don't know how to use it." _

_She calls it back to her across the distance between them. His eyes track it. It lands in her palm, and an orb of light pulses from it at her touch. She holds it up like a lantern and watches him as he stares at it, illuminated by the glow. _Feel it. Feel me. Do the same.

_The crystal arcs from her hand to his, a throw she wishes had been accompanied by a Force pull from him, but he just lets it come, gleaming but dark. The moment it touches his fingers, it glows with an inner brightness as he gingerly feeds the Force through its needle's eye. He stares in wonder at the emerald star in his hands, a star of his own making, and slowly looks up to meet her gaze in amazement. _

Ah, the moment of first realization. This is me. I can do this. I can make it glow.

_He fingers the dimly glistening crystal cautiously. _

_She rests her hands on her knees and gives in to a moment of weakness. "For a Jedi, the Force is like an ocean." She pretends, just for a little while, that he is her Padawan, hers to teach, and begins a basic lesson. "We use the Force, but more importantly we let it use us." _

"_How does that work?" _

"_Picture an ocean. No shore as far as the eye can see. There are waves, yes?" _

_He nods. She cannot glimpse images in his mind-not yet. Not ever. It requires training to broadcast, and a closeness to pick them up. She ignores the reality with a bitter shiver. _

"_We ride the waves. This is using the Force. We can choose which wave to ride, but the currents of the ocean direct which way the wave goes, not us. We have limited control, an amount of free will, but still the ocean is in charge. Do you see?" _

"_I get it." _

_She continues in this vein, philosophy and principles, until her comm beeps urgently. She groans aloud. _

"_You'd better go," he says. "Uh…thanks. For everything." He still holds the crystal loosely in one hand, and she knows he will treasure it. _

_She stands. He is still sitting, looking up at her. Discontent gnaws at her. If only she can think of the right thing to say, he will still be given the chance. "If the Council had permitted it," she blurts out, "would you have become a Jedi?" _

_He looks down at the green crystal and turns it over in his fingers. _

"_It would require ultimate commitment," she warns. "You would have to be a Jedi before anything else. Before being a human, or being a clone." That would be the hardest part, she knows, transcending to an alien world his brothers could know nothing of. _

_He still looks down. "No. I wouldn't want to." _

_She wants to scream, because she knows, she knows that given the chance she could change his mind and could mold him into a legendary healer, one of the greatest in the history of the Order. She pauses in the doorway, trying to think of what to say. The crystal turns over and over between his fingers, warm green and gleaming. "May the Force be with you," she manages, and leaves with outrage toward the wasteful tenets that would let such a promising student slip by. _

_He doesn't even look up._

* * *

><p>Master Che woke with a start. The dream-memory-still hazed the air in front of her eyes. With a groan, she buried her face in her pillow. Tears stung her eyes. The dream had not been of her current Padawan, but the student she had wanted and lost.<p>

_I don't just miss the potential Fib had. I miss the person he was. I miss the closeness I know we could have had._

Fear of losing another Padawan twisted her stomach. The tears froze in her eyes and wouldn't fall. "Oh, _Kad_…" she moaned.

* * *

><p>For the first few hours, Kad walked the Temple's deserted, blue-lit halls. His aimless wandering took him to old haunts and places he had yet to explore. He looked at them, studied them with a calmness born of a kind of disconnect.<p>

_This is not my life_, a part of him said. _My life starts again tomorrow. This is limbo._ _Nothing I do here matters. For now, for once, I'm free._

The amblings took him nowhere, even as they took him everywhere. This decision could not be taken back. If he left the Jedi to become a Skirata of Mandalore, he could never rejoin. If he let his clan go home alone, he would have sworn his life to the Order forever.

_Can I do either of those things?_ How could he be Vokara Che's Padawan and consider abandoning his clan? How could he be Darman's son and consider leaving his Master and friends?

Restless feet took him up to the Council Room. He surveyed the semicircle of twelve chairs and remembered late-night visits when Ani sneaked him and the twins up here and let them sit in Obi's chair. _Ani or Babuir. Obi or Buir._

He patted the wall until he found the seam. With pressure on the right places, it drew back, revealing a narrow crawlspace used by maintenance. A rickety metal ladder stretched up into the darkness. Kad climbed the ladder in the blackness, hand over hand, until his hair brushed the ceiling. The trapdoor teetered and rose as he pushed on it, until it swung open.

He crawled out onto the roof of the Council Spire, a flat circle with no walls. Voracious high-altitude winds blasted past him, cooled with the onset of night. The winds pressed against his shoulders and tried to prostrate him. He kept low and crept close enough to the edge to see the vast glittering city of lights that was Coruscant.

This place remained a secret from many Jedi. Maintenance droids rarely ventured up here; the hatch had been installed as a precaution, in case the roof ever needed to be fixed. And so the best seat in the Jedi Temple remained a secret, passed on from Master to Padawan, sometimes shared with a trusted friend, or occasionally discovered by accident. Obi-Wan first found it when he was a Padawan and unable to sleep, and only ever told his friend Siri and Anakin. Kad didn't doubt that Yoda knew about it, or that Mace Windu knew nothing of it. Ani brought him, Luke, and Leia up with Kad was nine, first making them take a vow of silence, half-kidding and half-serious. The view took their breath away, and they understood the desire for secrecy. Not just anyone could learn of this special place. They had to find it themselves, or earn your trust enough to deserve it.

Kad rested his chin on his knees and gazed out over Coruscant, the jewel of the Republic, a sight he loved. The lights shone, mostly yellow or white, but with a multitude of colors mixed in. Beyond the muttering of the wind, he could hear the chaotic blares of distant speeders. Light pollution outshone all but the brightest stars, but he didn't care. Artificial lights had always lit his nights. They comforted, even as he fell silent in awe at the clear skies of less densely populated worlds. What would it be like to live on a world where the stars shone clear and bright?

The hatch swung open so suddenly he slammed down on it with a Force push.

"Ouch!" hollered a familiar voice.

"Mara?"

She peered out of the hatch, rubbing her head. "Thanks a lot."

Kad stared at her as she scrambled onto the roof, barefoot and in her sleep clothes. He asked, "What are you doing up here?"

Mara crawled to the edge of the roof and peered over at the dizzying drop, kilometers to fall. "Love the view." She backed up and edged into a seated position next to him. "You seemed off, so I followed you. I'm worried about you, Kad. You have a big choice to make. I mean, deciding the path you're going to follow for the rest of your life. It's unfair that you have to make it and you're only twelve. Most other people don't ever have to make such a…clear-cut choice. Anyway, no offense, but I think it's a tad arrogant to make a choice like that without any feedback. So here I am." She fell silent.

Kad decided not to be offended by her presumptuousness and instead welcomed her unique brand of insight. He fiddled with his braid. "I just…I don't know what to think! I keep thinking, 'How can I go?' Then I think, 'How can I stay?' I have no idea _how_ to decide this, let alone which one." He balled his fists.

"You can say anything," Mara offered. She put one hand on his. "I'm not telling anyone."

"I wish this had never happened. I wish my clan had escaped and gone to Mandalore, and that's it." The words tumbled out in a rush.

Mara inched closer until she was right next to him, close enough that his skin tingled from her presence, but she never actually touched him. "I can see that."

Kad buried his head in her shoulder and sobbed. Tears held in for eleven years burst from him in a cathartic flood of grief and loss. Memories he had thought lost flashed tantalizingly and blurrily through his mind, driven to the surface by reminders and need.

…_A big man in red armor kneeling in front of him holding big knife- Encouraging words- And his tiny baby's hand grasping the saber properly. A delighted woman's voice that warms his heart, and triumph like he can take on the galaxy-…_

…_A rough man's voice singing to him in a dark room- Primal tribal feelings- He belongs to this song… _

…_Blue-skinned hands rolling a ball to him across a floor-…_

…_Someone standing over him. Bright light behind the man-a window-so the face is shadowed, but the purely happy smile is clear- And a giddy joy in him-…_

…_How much he loves them. By the pitiless stars, _how he loves them_. So strong it is a physical ache when-…_

…_Just a blaster shot. A single shot, the sound diamond-clear, the rest silence, the Force still. An inferno over the heart. Mama is gone…_

…_The sense of preparation. Leaving for home soon. Relief. Joy. Aching anger and grief and regret all mixed in… _

…_Laughter. Hugs. He is told so say something-"Ni ni"-but he is too sleepy. Everyone so happy and he dreams- Then-…_

…_A dull ache in his head of grief and fear and heartbreak. An opening door- Master Che. Only he thinks it is someone else. A fountain of relief wells up at his first glimpse of her- Then sudden realization. Back to anguish. She gathers him close and holds him in the Force-…_

…_Watching Leia's blanket flutter slightly as she breathes. There are stirrings of anguish. Veenna holds him and sings a distant song to him. He counts stars out the window. One, two, three, four, five…by and by…_

…_The musical clarity of his rattle as he taps out a song the Others sang. Obi nods along, puzzled. He likes Obi. He is new, and reminds him of Baboo…though he is no longer sure who that is._

_Then Master Windu comes. "Kad, give me the rattle." His outstretched hand to take it. He pulls back, and it breaks. Master Windu looks so grim. And he feels like he has lost everything. _

_Then Ani dives in to hold him, and Master Che and Obi come at a run, and he feels the now long-known and deep-seated love flower in his heart…_

…_Ani takes the clan to the Star Room. The glowing drops of light reflect in Luke's wide eyes. Ani plays Coruscant for them, and Alderaan, Tatooine. The others all spread out to find a favorite planet, one they have heard of, or where they know themselves to have been born. He wanders among the stars, just looking._

_Leia calls plaintively from across the room, "Ani! Ani, I can't reach it!" _

_Ani goes to help her. He activates a planet's recording on the way. "Mandalore. Fifth planet of the Mandalore system-" _

_His head turns toward the sound. The words cause a stirring, a flash of recognition. It feels the way it might if Obi had told him a story long ago, a story whose characters and plot, beginning and end he has forgotten. But when Obi reminds him about it, begins to outline the story, he is fairly sure he's heard it before, even if he doesn't know the words. He sits down beneath the incandescent orb and listens and listens. _

_He doesn't know how long he is there before Ani touches his shoulder and says, "Kad? It's time to go."_

_He goes with the clan to a sunny room, where they roll a brown ball to one another with the Force. He feels oddly soothed but vaguely sad. Halfway through the exercise, he moves to sit between Luke and Leia. He tests the Force and feels a silvery link between them. Leia's hand brushes his in unconscious response. He reaches cautiously into the immensity that is the Force. Obi and Ani are engaged in fast, no-holds-barred sparring, a bright shimmer of mutual joy around them. Master Che feels his questing and responds with a probe of concern, then brisk warmth. He even finds Ferris, like vanishing mist that has to exert itself to be sensed. But Ferris is there, and is happy. The ball is pushed in his direction. He concentrates, stops it with a look, and pulls his searching tendrils back close. Everyone he now loves best safely accounted for, he focuses his considerable power and sends the little ball rolling… _

The tears left him wrung out. He leaned against Mara in silence for a long time, immersed in fragmented memories. _Ordo taught me how to hold a saber. Laseema used to roll a ball to me, a red ball. Mereel sang to me. My mother was killed by a blaster bolt to the heart. I didn't say "goodnight" the last night I saw them. When I was eighteen months old, I still remembered _Vode An_ and shook it out on my rattle. Master Windu gave me my first lesson on the dangers of attachment._ He examined these relics from his past with disconnected wonder. Mara kept an arm around him, warming him against the nipping winds.

"Mara?" he asked into a faceful of curly red hair.

"Hmmm?"

Kad pulled away, calm now, and gauged Mara's reaction. "Do you ever regret that the Jedi took you? Do you think your life would have been…more meaningful or useful if they hadn't?"

Mara frowned speculatively as she stared out over Coruscant's jabbing, soaring space scrapers, at the dark clouds beginning to mass overhead. "Nah."

"But you were older." Kad wondered how someone could remember their family and not miss them. He knew now that his clan's absence had always been a hole in his heart that nothing the Jedi provided could fill. The ache had always been there, even after he put it aside and eventually forgot the reason for its existence.

Mara wrapped a coil of hair around one finger. "I was born on Corellia. I know I had a little sister, and she had red hair like I do. We had a bird of some kind, a pet. I hated it, because it pecked me." She shrugged carelessly. "A Twi'lek found me when I was four-I don't know who. My parents didn't really want me to go, but they gave me up anyway. My guess is they were 'sacrificing their happiness for the greater good.' You know, the way some people do because they love to feel like victims of fate."

Kad drew her back to the discussion before she went off on a scathing tangent. "But do you ever wish your life had been different?" Something very well might hinge on her answer, though he had no idea what.

Mara shook her head. "Why would I? I mean, it's not like my life has been any more meaningful or helpful or whatever you said. I don't know if it has been or not. You know I'm the last one to bow in reverence to the Jedi ideal or anything, but…it's _my life_. My home, my Master, my friends. Maybe they're not any better than anyone else's, maybe they're worse, but they're pretty good. And they're mine. Why would I want to exchange them?"

Kad wondered if Mara's simplistic, vaguely possessive life philosophy wasn't one of the truest things he'd ever heard. He tilted his head back and watched the encroaching cloud cover, dark thunderheads that rolled in swollen with monstrous potential. The lights of Coruscant reflected off the bottoms of flat gray clouds, but not these monster storms. The wind blew, biting with the threat of rain. "But what should I do?"

White lightning flashed, followed by a roaring thunderclap. Electricity, present at such a high altitude, buzzed along Kad's skin, making the hairs on his arms stand on end. Mara grabbed his arm and crawled toward the hatch as the wind picked up. They tumbled through the trapdoor and scampered down the ladder.

Kad jumped out to let Mara topple through the seam in the wall. "Whoa," he breathed, but thunder broke with a deafening boom like a detonated bomb so loud even he couldn't hear his own word. Rain lashed the Council Room windows like vengeful tears. Lightning struck a building in the distance. The world flash-froze into stark black and white, a reverse world where the darkness was brighter than the light. Then the second was over, the lightning died, and the rain drummed on to thunderous accompaniment.

"This is the first unplanned thunderstorm since I can remember," he marveled.

Mara pressed her face against the window. "I hope it stops by tomorrow, or no one's going to be breaking atmosphere. They'd get struck by lightning." She turned. Affectionate exasperation stretched her mouth into a wry grin. "You're making this too complicated, you know."

Kad shook his head. "It's more complicated than you could guess."

Mara shrugged. "Dumb it down then. Here's the one and only question you should be asking yourself: Which alternative am I going to be able to live with and be happy with for the rest of my life?"

* * *

><p><strong>The rattle memory was based on a memory of Mace Windu's from the book Shatterpoint, by the way. Questions? Comments? Rants?<strong>

**Please review.**

**mad'ika**


	19. Chapter 19 Always

**I do not own Star Wars.**

* * *

><p>Ch. 19: Always<p>

Ordo hummed as he stowed the clothes the healers had provided for him in a small pack with a few other essentials, the most important being a wickedly sharp knife Fi had bought for him at a Coruscant weapons' manufacturer. The narrow blade tapered sleekly; it was just the right size to slip between ribs without nicking against one. He admired superior craftsmanship like that, even if the knife was only a placeholder until he got himself a real saber.

_Not knife-_kal, he reminded himself. _Like _Buir_. And not saber-_kad_. Like my nephew. I need to start thinking in _Mando'a_._ He cinched the bag up tight and scanned the room to make sure nothing was left behind.

Besany stood in the doorway. The sun gleamed off her hair, turning the graying blond strands to silvery-gold. The sight struck him dumb. She smiled at him. Tragic lines creased her face, but he thought they only enhanced her beauty.

"Ready to go home, _Ord'ika_?" she asked.

He crossed the distance between them and hugged her carefully but tightly. She was still weak, but would make a full recovery. "Definitely. More ready than I've ever been." He looked around. "You know, I loathe this place. It's so airy and pristine, it doesn't seem real. What I want is a farm with loud, stinky animals, dirt under my fingernails, and plenty of real weapons that cut and don't just cauterize."

If his bloodthirsty streak bothered her, she didn't say anything. She just leaned her head against his shoulder. "I think it's peaceful myself. More like a retreat than a home, though. A farm sounds lovely. A wonderful place to raise a family."

Ordo's heart skipped a beat. "You want to-"

She glanced up at him with a siren-like smile. "I think I'm young enough yet. But don't hold your breath. You know it takes a while without growth vats."

Ordo was already thinking up names. "When it happens, can I tell _Buir_?"

"Of course."

Ordo was about to kiss her when Mereel popped in, spoiling the moment. "Hey, _ner vod_. Come on, the ship's here!"

"But the public transport doesn't leave for an hour!" Ordo protested as he slung his bag over his shoulder and hurried after Mereel, who practically skipped down the hall.

"This ship is _ours_," he called. "You'll never guess. The Chancellor bought it for us!"

* * *

><p>Anakin was not surprised that Bail Organa had bought the Mandalorians a ship. The man still made chivalrous assumptions about politics, and the rather unpleasant discovery that his predecessor used the Senate Building basement as a makeshift morgue for those not quite dead must have struck quite a chord of guilt and discomfort.<p>

He stood off to one side of the hangar with the others who had come to see Clan Skirata off. Obi-Wan, the twins, Mara, Ferris, Zey, and several healers made up the assembly. Kad had yet to appear.

The new ship sat on the extended platform outside. Last night's rain left the air unseasonably cool, and the only remaining clouds hung high and wispy in the cerulean sky.

Clan Skirata engaged themselves in the chaotic task of loading everything on board while the Nulls, heedless to the fact that the others might need their help, explored the large ship they swiftly dubbed _Or'dinii_, or "complete lunatic." Anakin suspected the name had something to do with the contrast between the Chancellor buying them a ship with his private finances and their banking scheme that had ripped trillions of credits off from Republic citizens, which Jedi hackers had quietly closed down and siphoned off a good half of the profit-though he doubted that would stop them for long. They really didn't need the money now that the clones got hefty pensions for their service in the war, and the fund still had over a trillion credits in it. Miraculously, no one wanted to report them for theft. Finally, they loaded everything. The Jedi moved forward to say their goodbyes.

Master Che checked over her four star patients one last time. "You will follow the regimen I set up for you, or there will be dire consequences," she told Kal threateningly.

He crossed his arms and smiled in amusement. "From you?"

She smiled craftily. "From your sons."

Ordo spoke loudly from behind Kal. "She's right, _Buir_. You wanted us to get to like _jetiise_. Well, now we've formed an alliance."

"The Police-Kal-Skirata's-Every-Move Alliance?" Kal asked in annoyance.

"That's the one," Jaing agreed.

Kal sighed. "I supposed I asked for that. Fine. I _will_, Master Vokara. You can be sure I will, with these boys monitoring me."

She nodded. "That's all I ask. Take care of yourselves, and be happy." "I plan to," Vau interrupted as he sidled between her and Kal with Mird sauntering along at his heels. Verp squeaked nervously and rushed to catch up.

Master Che shook her head as she watched him. "That man is so arrogant."

Kal chuckled. "Are you kidding? He's feeling downright benevolent. This is Walon at his best. Most annoying, granted, but best."

The two groups mingled as friends and acquaintances said their goodbyes, sometimes formally and sometimes with casual affection. Zey pulled Jusik aside for a private word. Though they had never been close, they had apparently made their peace, and were able to shake hands and wish one another well earnestly. The healers bade farewell to their longtime patients fondly, and even Laseema managed a smile.

Anakin stopped in front of Kal. "Thanks for listening. It helped."

Kal smiled crookedly. "If you ever need to vent again, I'm a comm call away."

"I hope so." He bowed, but Kal caught his arm and pulled him into a bear hug instead.

"You're just not good at arm's-length living, son."

Anakin glanced over the old man's shoulder at Obi-Wan, currently being accosted by an overly enthusiastic Mird. "I'll survive. I've been training Master Kenobi in the fine art of physical contact for years. There'll be a breakthrough any day now."

"Hope springs eternal," Kal laughed and released him.

Anakin saw Mereel come to a jaunty stop in front of Mara and shot to their side.

Mara glanced at him, but her look was less sharp than usual. "Can't I just have a moment alone?" She heaved an annoyed sigh.

Before Anakin could answer, a hugely grinning Mereel smacked him between the shoulder blades hard enough to wind him. "So long, buddy. I'll miss ya."

Anakin resisted the urge to poke his eyes out in retaliation. _Five more minutes and he's gone. Serenity, serenity, serenity… _He smiled woodenly at Mereel. "I'm glad you're going."

Mereel stared at him. "Ouch," he said, sounding genuinely bruised.

_Oh, stang._ "Home, I mean," he amended quickly. "I'm glad you're going _home_ to where you belong. That's what's best."

Mara stomped lightly on his foot under the cover of their over-robes. "He gets it, Master." She faced Mereel. "Is Kad going with you?"

Mereel turned solemn. "I don't know. He didn't say anything to you?" "I talked to him last night, but I have no idea what he's decided. Where is he, anyway?"

"Give him time," Anakin murmured to her.

"I know," she returned, somber for once. "I'm just worried about him." Then she focused on Mereel. "Well, I'm glad you're going home too, but I'm going to miss you. You were a lot of fun."

"Maybe I'll see you around sometime," Mereel said as he hugged her. "_No_," Anakin pronounced firmly.

Mereel glanced at him, a mischievous gleam in his eye, leaned down, and kissed Mara on the cheek. She gaped, blushing. Luckily for Mereel, he was not in arm's reach, or Anakin very well might have murdered him then and there.

The Null raced to safety among his brothers, waving his fingers tauntingly. "So long, buddy!"

"Jedi do not take revenge," Anakin reminded himself under his breath as he forced his mechanical fingers to relax before they ground down their servos.

Mara rubbed her cheek and stared at her fingers like she expected them to have changed color. "Well, that's a first. It…wasn't bad."

"You are not to kiss anyone again as long as you are my Padawan."

She glanced up at him, then sighed in resignation. "I suppose this is as good as it gets." To Anakin's shock, she gave his mechanical hand a squeeze, using their sleeves as cover, then bolted to join Luke and Leia. He blinked after her.

Before he could follow and ask for an explanation, he caught sight of Kad as he stepped into the hangar. Dark circles stood out under his eyes, but his face was composed and his eyes calm. He felt still and sad, but sure. Everyone must have been on the lookout for him, because they all quieted when he entered.

Kad walked to the middle of the group and looked around. For the last time, he belonged to both peoples equally. No more could he be wholly in two worlds. Anakin studied his friend for clues. He wore his tunic but not his over-robe-going? But his lightsaber still hung from his belt-staying? If he left he would not be allowed to take it, but he may want to give it to Master Che or Obi-Wan personally. The way his eyes lingered on Mara or slid off Laseema, were those signs that- Anakin clamped down on his thoughts before his groundless speculations drove him crazy. _Whatever makes him happy_, he thought resolutely.

Kad's eyes drifted to Master Che, but skipped quickly over her and settled on Darman. Even the air seemed to listen as he looked at his shoes, gathering himself. Then he looked up. "I'm staying."

Everyone's collective exhalation made it sound like the Force itself gasped-or sobbed. Kad began to shake as tears streamed down his face. Master Che made to go to him, but he fled into Darman's arms.

Obi-Wan touched all the Jedi through the Force, feather-light. _Let them be._ They backed to a respectful distance.

Luke retreated to Obi-Wan's side. "Obi?"

Obi-Wan watched Clan Skirata close ranks around Kad and Darman, hiding them from view, but the emotions bled off them. "Hmm?"

"I'm glad he's staying. I am, but now that I know he is…I wish he was going with them." Luke laughed shakily and blinked tears from his eyelashes. "Isn't that the strangest thing?"

"Nothing about this situation is easy, Luke. I feel the same way." Obi-Wan put an arm around Luke, who leaned against him.

Leia slipped under Anakin's arm. "I didn't know it would be so sad, Ani." She glanced up at him, looking young and lost.

"It's always sad when someone has to choose, Leia."

"I never want to have to."

_And I pray you never will._ His heart ached for the boy who was as much his son as Luke was.

Master Che blew her nose on her new handkerchief. Besides that, they waited in silence.

At last the wall of clones parted. Calm now, Kad stood beside Darman. He began to back away, but after a few steps, sprinted the distance between them. For a heart-stopping instant, Anakin thought he'd changed his mind. But Kad stood on his tiptoes and, cupping his hand around his mouth to hide his words, whispered in Darman's ear. The clone's mouth opened, and he looked down at his son in surprise. He reached out a hand and brushed Kad's cheek, a smile slowly growing on his face. Kad smiled back. Eyes overly bright, they each took a slow step back. Giving one another permission to go on living, Anakin caught himself thinking.

"_Re'turcye mhi_." Kad bade his father farewell in a strong voice, echoing with Mandalorian vigor.

Darman responded with a bow so accurate he appeared to be a Jedi. "May the Force be with you."

"And you, always."

"_Re'turcye mhi_." Darman took another backward step, then swung and, looking always over his shoulder, boarded the ship. The other Mandalorians all hugged Kad and exchanged words in their turn, then filed on after Darman.

Mird advanced with its offspring to the edge of the gangway, grumbling in reassurance. Verp raised a tentative paw, almost touched the gangway, and snatched it away like it had been burned. It keened at Mird in distress.

Vau peered from the door down at the pair. "Are you coming, _Mird'ika_?"

Mird snorted, finally fed up with Verp's histrionics. It ambled up the ramp with a dismissive flick of its tail. Verp danced from foot to foot in an agony of indecision. Mird disappeared into the hold. With a wail that felt rather like_ Mommy, wait! I love you!_, it bolted forward and shot up into the ship. The hatch clanged shut, almost drowning out Vau's triumphant laugh. Almost.

The ship lifted off and hovered in the air above the dock. Though its viewscreens were one-way, the observers in the hangar could feel eyes lingering on Kad. Then the _Or'dinii _rotated, pointed its nose at the sky, and shot for space.

Kad tilted his head back and gazed after them. Silhouetted against Coruscant's cityscape, he looked so lonely. Master Che moved forward and put her arm around him. He leaned against her, but didn't say a word. Instead he watched his clan's silver ship rise until it disappeared into the bright blue sky.

* * *

><p>Kad's heart ached. He hadn't anticipated this much pain.<p>

He and his friends sat grouped around a bench in a ferny corner of the Room of a Thousand Fountains after a long session of joint meditation. Kad drooped wearily to the cool stone of the bench, Luke and Leia leaning against him on either side. Together they propped one another up. Mara perched on the edge of the bench, watching him quietly, shaken by the knowledge that her words might very well have decided his choice. He glanced at her and, as best he could with a look, extended thanks and the feeling that there was no need for forgiveness. The adults sat on the green pebble path with the exception of Ferris, who nestled down in the ferns quite happily.

"Why did you choose what you did, Padawan?" Master Che asked, leaning forward to touch him on the shoulder. She kept doing that, Kad noticed, a hand on his arm, a brief touch to his back. Maybe she was trying to comfort him with physical contact. Or maybe she was reassuring herself that he was still there, and still hers, in the flesh.

Kad looked up at her. "Are you asking because I need to reflect, or are you just curious, Master?" The honorific sounded odd to his ears after a week of immersion in Mandalorian culture, but it still felt right. She was the closest being to a mother he had ever known. _I hope she's done a good job in your place, Mama._

Master Che dismissed the difference between reflection and curiosity with a peremptory huff. "At my age, curiosity no longer exists. All is need-to-know. And I do need to know," she added, almost in a confession. "I haven't always been fair to you, holding you up to an unreachable standard."

Kad looked away briefly at the implied mention of Fib. His feelings about the clone were mixed. He liked him after meeting him last year and felt sorry that he had never been given a chance with the Jedi. At the same time, the clone's shadow stretched far over his relationship with his Master, a colossal presence they never mentioned but he could never escape. Fib fit into his life in a painful way: an older brother who surpassed his mother's expectations, was her uncontested favorite child, and who died suddenly and tragically; when a new son arrived unexpectedly a short time later, the mother was delighted, and loved the child for himself, but was secretly disappointed when he failed to live up to his older brother's legacy. Or perhaps like an adoption that was almost finalized but revoked at the last minute, and the one that went through never quite filled the void. He knew Master Che never considered him a stand-in, consciously anyway, but the regret hung between them, huge and unmentionable. Kad struggled to think of something to say. "I-"

"It's unfair," Master Che continued firmly, "because I never had the chance to train him, and so he can do no wrong. You have your weak points, Kad, and I know them better than I know the hilt of my lightsaber. But Fib has weaknesses too, and I never had to learn what they are, or figure out how to deal with them. I was blinded by his one visible strength to the rough spots we were bound to have hit. You, now-" She smiled, and nothing more needed to be said.

Kad smiled slightly, shy and pleased and sad. "I don't love them," he said, meaning his clan. Realizing his words, his heart seized with excruciating guilt. He shook his head to clear the words. "That sounds terrible, and it's wrong. I mean, I really like them. I _do_ love them, but…not in that way. I feel the potential there. I _know_ I could love them like that, after a while." He looked up at everyone around him. "But I already love you."

So the reason for his staying was revealed. He felt like a flower with its petals peeled open too early by curious hands, leaving his heart exposed to a pounding sun and gaping sky. A Jedi for whom attachment was forbidden…remaining a Jedi so he wouldn't have to leave the ones he loved. Ironic, but true.

Kad looked down at the hand that bore his weight, next to Luke's. He searched for words to express the knot that was his heart. "I know I could love them. Now, I mean, and not just in a dream of a memory. I know I could be happy on Mandalore, and have a good life there. But I'm already happy here, and I know for sure I'll have a good life. I-I didn't want to risk everything I already have on a maybe. A Jedi doesn't cling to the past." A tear rolled down one cheek and dripped off his chin.

Ani dropped to his knees beside the Triumvirate and hugged all three of them.

"They said they can love me even though I'm not Mandalorian," Kad gasped. "I _know_ I've done the right thing- Or at least I think I have. But _Buir_- And Kal-_Babuir_-" He buried his face in Anakin's shoulder. "Ani, I've hurt them all so much!"

Ani twined his fingers through Kad's hair. "It will be all right, Kad," he whispered. "It will hurt terribly, but it will be all right."

Kad wept for the lost possibilities, the might-have-beens that would haunt him forever. They seemed to bear down on him like specters turned vicious with grief, to try to force him to his knees, to his face in the dirt, grind him into dust and wipe any trace of him from existence. _But I'm stronger than you_, he told the wailing ghosts. _I _am_. I have _vencuyot_, and I'm not going to let regret destroy that. Leave me._

The tragic phantoms faded into the background. Again and again he would find them peering over his shoulder, cold fingers on his skin at night, weeping longing in his ear. Maybe, occasionally, he would pity them and listen to their moaned stories, but now they must stay at bay. He knew Master Che fought this continuous battle with regrets over Fib, and had felt for years that Ani did, too, though he didn't know why. Maybe he would ask them about it, someday.

Finally Kad regained control. He leaned back into Luke and Leia, felt the living, substantial warmth of their skin against his, and drew strength from that. "I'm glad I know, at least. Where I'm from. What happened," he admitted.

Obi-Wan knelt down beside him, and Anakin moved over to make way for his former Master's peculiar form of wisdom. Kad averted his eyes. Obi's eyes made him think of mirrors, where you saw yourself in your truth, whether you wanted to or not. Now, he wasn't so sure.

"You know they're always with you, Kad," the Master said seriously. "You might not be Mandalorian, or part of their clan in the conventional way, but they are still a part of you."

Kad nodded. "I know."

"Tell me how."

He wanted to sleep, but he made himself think. "They gave me my name. Kad. _Saber._ Skirata- If that's okay," he added with a cautious glance at Master Che.

She nodded. "I think it's the right thing to do. Jedi Kad Skirata."

Her words affected a change in Kad's body, an imperceptible shift in the way he held himself, perhaps a more even alignment of the shoulders. He noticed the change with sad delight. By stating who he was in that way, both Jedi and Skirata, Master Che united the past with the future, the might-have-been with the is-now. His life was no longer fractured into two distinct periods. Instead it was woven together in one continuous flow.

"There's more," Obi-Wan pressed gently.

"The dreams," Kad said reluctantly. "The good ones. And the memories, now. The knowledge that I have someone who wants me, if I ever need them."

Obi-Wan nodded. "All true, but you've forgotten something else. Something even more important than your name."

Kad looked at him in confusion.

"The core of any Jedi. Your purest self."

Kad's hand automatically went to his lightsaber hilt. He unclipped it from his belt and examined it, uncomprehending. Obi took it gently and held it in the standard guard position, then deftly flipped it around into the Shien reverse grip. "The way you hold a saber."

He handed Kad his weapon. Kad stared at it, remembered his distant memory of Ordo in red armor, Yoda's attempts to correct him when they first learned the standard grip and he, not quite four, _knew_ somehow that the deviant Shien reverse was the _proper _way to hold a saber. Aching joy suffused him at this intrinsic way his clan had helped form him. He returned his Jedi saber to his belt. Looking up, he caught a glimpse of himself in Obi's eyes. His own face looked back, as it always had. That seemed wrong, somehow. Shouldn't something have changed?

He looked around at them all. "They're not my family. I've always felt that you are. But they _are_ my _aliit_."

It was the _Mando'a_ word for family, clan, tribe, but for Kad it encompassed so much more. It was Darman's hand on his shoulders, Kal's body-shaking laughter, his dream-like memories, the gritty reality he had come to know, their past and present and _ven_, acceptance of him so great they could make themselves love what they had once hated. All for him. Family and _alit_ felt similar, but they weren't the same at all. _Maybe…my Jedi family is my now and forever. My _aliit_ is my always._ A shoreless ocean and an eternal river, each waiting for him.

"They always will be. I…I told _Buir_ about Qui-Gon's Way."

Stunned silence fell. "You told someone?" Mara whispered in shock. "But the Council said not to tell _anyone ever_."

Qui-Gon's Way: the Jedi path to immortality, in which you became one with the Force but still retained your sense of self and could communicate with other Force-sensitives after death. Masters taught their Padawans at the beginning of their apprentice training. After days or weeks of intensely focused meditation, directed so far outward that at the end you forgot yourself, a small but crucial change occurred somewhere inside, like coal pressed into diamond. Force-ghosts were not common, but occasionally one would appear, often for a word with an old friend about something important, either galactic or personal. The departed spoke also of a place beyond to which they would someday transcend, once they were ready to forever give up contact with the physical world. This Kad had whispered to Darman, to let him know his son still had an afterlife, and to give him hope for a reunion with his beloved wife someday.

Obi-Wan tugged at his beard with a wry grimace. "Why don't we…not mention that to anyone?"

They all nodded fervent agreement.

Kad looked around. "I want to see them someday. Just a visit. I know we can't have families, but there's no rule against visiting friends, is there?" Ani smiled broadly. "What do you know, Master? He's found a loophole."

Master Che smiled at him as well and looped a companionable arm around his shoulders. "That's my Padawan."

Ferris purred lightly from his hidden nest in the ferns, his version of amused chuckling. Kad felt a lightness settle in his chest along with the pain. If Ferris purred, all was well.

Closing his eyes, he reached into the Force and felt for Darman. His father was weary and sad, but full of excitement at finally going home. Bidding him goodbye for now, Kad opened his eyes.

The light and pain, side by side in his heart, mixed with a strange tingling feeling, almost like a melody. It both soothed and hurt. Given time, he thought, that searing feeling would become, hopefully, peace.

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><p>Quinlan arrived back at the Temple almost a week later after catching a ride in on a public transport packed with disagreeable thugs. He had barely escaped with his life. He walked slowly to the Temple along streets under a twilight sky, a feeling closer to misgivings than dread dragging at his feet. He wondered what Yoda had decided to do with him.<p>

_I did not break any laws, but that's not all the Council worries about, is it?_ He grimaced. Only in the Jedi Order could you be rebuked for simply doing something morally gray. _Did I do the right thing?_ He wanted to answer in the affirmative without hesitation, but he found that he couldn't. Seeing the heartbroken baby who grew into a quiet boy had always made him feel hot and cornered. During their confrontation, every word he'd spoken had been true.

Still, he thought as his hand drifted of its own accord to the glazed metal hilt of his lightsaber, fingers tracing the outline of a long-invisible scorch mark, he did wish his actions hadn't been necessary. If only the boy's family hadn't conspired as ambitiously as they had, if they hadn't so flagrantly violated the laws, maybe they would have slipped on by, and the arrest would never have happened. _They brought it on themselves, but he didn't do anything. I wish he hadn't been hurt by their mistakes. _The blackened spot on his lightsaber was no longer visible, but the heat of the blast had melted the metal just enough that it rippled there, undulating under his fingers instead of curving smoothly away.

His vaguely reflective mood dried up as he entered the Temple complex, souring quickly to cagey unease. He entered the front hall, feeling as if the eyes of hundreds stared down at him, though only a distant few wandered the upper balconies. He walked slowly down the hall.

Beside one of the pillars stood Master Yoda, hands folded on the head of his cane. "Welcome home, Master Vos," he said conversationally, peering up at the human.

Quinlan stopped two meters away, watchful but warily hopeful. "Then I will not be banished?"

Yoda's ears tilted forward as he smiled. "Banished? No. Keep you, we will." Quinlan started to relax, but Yoda held up a hand. "A different punishment, we have in mind. Take Kyp Durron as her Padawan Master Secura has. Worry about him not."

"But what is my punishment?"

Yoda smiled slowly. "Under house arrest you will be, Quinlan, for the foreseeable future."

Quinlan tried to process exactly what this meant. "So I will be confined to the Temple?"

"To the gardens you may go. The front courtyard, yes. But beyond the gate or over the wall? No, or hunt you down, I will." Yoda squinted at him. Only half-joking, then.

Quinlan could barely fathom the months of boredom ahead. He _hated_ being confined to the Temple. The lack of free reign had driven him up the wall as a youngling, and Yoda knew it. "Master-" he sputtered.

Yoda smiled blissfully. "Worry not. _Occupied_, you will be." He held up a toothbrush.

Quinlan blanched.

Yoda handed him the object. "Start tomorrow, you should. Much ground to cover, have you." He looked brightly around the front hall. "Start here, you should. A good cleaning, it could use." He patted Quinlan's arm. "Save you, I wish to. Hate to the dark side leads." For an instant he was the Yoda from the war, grave and solemn. Then he cackled. "Scrub the nastiness out of yourself, you will." The Master tapped away, humming off-key.

Quinlan stared at the harmless-looking toothbrush in his hand and wondered whether banishment would have been the better option.

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><p><strong>Please review. <strong>

**mad'ika**


	20. Chapter 20 Brighter Still

**I do not own Star Wars. **

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><p>Ch. 20 Brighter Still<p>

Kad Skirata walked down the hall toward the comm station, movements loose and easy in the way of someone who often practiced hand-to-hand. The faint scent of burnt hair hung around him which, oddly, elicited congratulatory words from other Jedi as he went by on his unhurried way. Kad smiled slightly, the self-conscious pride still rearing its head as he reached up to touch were his Padawan braid used to be. It felt wrong sometimes, without it dangling well down his back behind his right ear. At just under twenty-four, he had been Knighted this morning.

He arrived at the comm station and requisitioned a private channel, holo and sound. He waiting, humming, while a droid made the necessary adjustments. He tapped out a rousing tune on the hilt of his lightsaber. _Glory! One indomitable heart, Brothers All!…_

"The channel is operational, Knight Skirata," the droid informed him primly.

"Thank you. If you could go, this is a private call."

The droid acquiesced and trundled from the room. With a flurry of taps, Kad entered the comm coordinates and waited while the call shot through interstellar space. _…Every last traitorous soul shall fall. Forged like the saber in the fires of death, Brothers All!_

The comm crackled and hissed. An image solidified above it: a vigorously middle-aged man in overalls, skin deeply tanned from a life of the outdoors, graying hair still military short. Kad stepped onto the transmission pad, and Darman Skirata's face creased into a brilliant smile. "_Kad'ika_! It's been awhile."

Kad smiled passively and waited for him to figure out the difference. Darman looked him up and down. "You're so tall now. I swear you've grown since the last time I saw you."

"Well, it has been five years since we last visited, _Buir_." At twenty-three, Kad remained lean instead of muscular, but he had shot up until he was almost as tall as Ani and had a good four centimeters on Luke. Dressed in pale tan robes, face generally composed with emotions understated, he appeared thoroughly Jedi to most people-unless he was fighting vigorously with someone, when his eyes took on a vaguely feral gleam. He made sure to keep All Out under strict lock and key unless fighting with either of the Amidala twins. Then, and only then, was it really safe to go completely insane, because he knew they could match him blow for blow, and drew him back in with a cry if need be. Their insanity matches were a secret between the three of them, because they were thrilling and dangerous and likely to get somebody hurt someday. But they hadn't yet, so they still fought that way occasionally, late at night. One day they would grow a little bit wiser and call the matches off, he knew, but they were still young and allowed themselves a healthy leeway for trial and error.

"How are Luke and Leia?"

"They were both Knighted today," Kad said smoothly, and waited to see if Darman picked up the hint.

"Really? Tell them congratulations for me. And Mara?"

"Knighted last year. Ani, Obi, Ferris, and Master Che are all fine. They send their best wishes."

"Warrez got married last year," Darman returned cheerfully. "And Besany's pregnant again."

"Great! What is that, their third?"

"Fourth. _Buir_'s loving it."

Kad gave up. "I was Knighted too, _Buir_."

Darman's mouth fell open as he stared at his son. "Fierfek! Why wasn't I invited?"

Kad laughed. "It's not exactly an open house, _Buir_. Don't worry. Now that I'm a Knight, I have a little more free reign. I asked the Council to give me a two-month reprieve before my first solo mission. I wondered if I could drop by, spend some time with you."

Darman smiled so widely it was miraculous that his cheeks didn't crack. "Of course you can! When can you get here?"

"I'll be there in two days. Talk to you then. The Council promised not to call me away unless there's another galaxy-shattering crisis."

"Don't tempt fate."

"Goodbye. See you soon." Kad hung up on his excited father and sprinted to the hangar.

As he ripped past the Healing Halls, Master Che stuck her head out. "Remember, back in two months! I've marked it on the calendar."

He halted and turned to face her. "Master, I can keep my own schedule."

"Not my Padawan. I know." Her eyes teared up as she fingered the thin rope of his glossy black hair that stuck out of her pocket.

Kad hugged her. "I'll be back, Master. You know I will."

She wiped at her eyes with an annoyed growl. "Oh, I know. You've never broken your promises. I'm just going to miss you, that's all. You've been such a part of my life that I'm going to be rather lonely without you." She sighed. "Maybe you should start calling me Vokara. We're practically equals now, after all."

Kad snorted. "In your dreams, Master."

Master Che pressed a hand against his cheek. "I'm proud of you." The heartfelt moment lasted for an instant, then she swung him around and pushed him in the direction of the hangar. "Go on. Darman's waiting." He made it three steps before she tapped his elbow. "Tell Kal to start taking these dietary supplements. They should ease his arthritis a bit."

Kad obediently downloaded the short list onto his datapad. "All right."

He made it another five steps before Master Che caught up with him again. "I forgot! I've altered his stretching regimen to account for the greater flexibility it should be producing. The leg lifts should be at _this_ angle, not this one." She grabbed his leg and demonstrated. "See the difference?" "Yeah. It should really reduce the pressure on his knee and increase strength in his thigh. Master, I've got to go now."

"Check for any ill effects!" she called after him. "Do you have your healing crystal?"

Without turning, he lifted it, feeding a tendril of Force into it until it glowed azure. This time, he made it all the way to the hangar where row upon row of sleek ships were kept. These were a new breed of ship, designed especially for used by Force-sensitives, called X-wings. They had no comm systems, as well as being adapted to better withstand hairpin turns and spectacular flips. Kad approached his, an ebony black beauty he had named _Mandalorian Sunrise_.

He swung into the cockpit by the time Master Che appeared in the door of the hangar. "And tell Vau that with all that hellishly spicy food he's eating, and considering the state of his digestive system, he should only drink soy milk!"

Kad laughed aloud. "Like that's going to happen," he called, and flipped the hatch closed. The_ Sunrise_ sprang gracefully into the sky and shot like an arrow for space.

Kad realized he was humming again as he went through his checklist. _Our vengeance burns brighter still…_ He closed his eyes with a fond shake of the head. "Vengeance is corrosive, you know," he said aloud to the cockpit. "But you'll never listen to me on that." They would stick stubbornly to their lyrics until the end of time. Fair enough. Kad agreed with his Jedi teachers about the nature of revenge. But he did think there must be a better word than vengeance, which really wasn't as defining a trait of the Mandalorians as they would have the rest of the galaxy believe. Our resolve burns brighter still? Our _aliit _burns brighter still?

Our love burns brighter still?

Well, he thought with a smile, whatever it was, he wouldn't bring it up. His uncles needed some militaristic pride left that didn't involve leading shrieking bands of nieces and nephews against one another in play tribal warfare.

The _Sunrise_ broke atmosphere. He looked down at glittering Coruscant. _I'll be back soon, Master. By my word as a Jedi, I swear._

The ship's black nose rotated until it pointed in the direction of distant, wild Mandalore. For an instant, it hung motionless in space. Then, with a crack, it leaped into hyperspace and disappeared.

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><p><em>Love. Sustainer of life, vanquisher of shadows, stronger than memory, greater than death. <em>

_Peace embraces the galaxy at last, a lull that will endure until the next great conflict, which will come as surely as stars die. But those who understand the nature of things do not fear this next challenge, however far in the future it may be. For again heroes will rise to meet the enemy, to stand against the dark and drive it away. Again will the luminous love of families provide a light in the dark times. The galaxy will be ready when night descends again. _

_But for now, day has come to the resurrected, thriving Republic, to the healing Jedi and their flourishing one-time army, and to one family torn apart by conflict, only to realize that it was always stronger than war. _

_Day has come. _

_May the Force be with us._

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><p><strong><em>The End.<em>**

**As always, please review. **

**mad'ika**


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